Over the weekend, hackers stole over $290 million in cryptocurrencies from Kelp DAO, a protocol that permits customers to earn yield on their idle crypto investments.
By Monday, LayerZero, one of many initiatives affected by the hack, had accused North Korea of finishing up the theft. The hack is the most important cryptocurrency theft to date this yr, following the April hack of cryptocurrency alternate Drift that netted the hackers about $285 million in earnings.
In keeping with a publish on X, LayerZero mentioned hackers exploited the Kelp DAO by way of the LayerZero bridge, which permits completely different blockchains to ship directions to one another. The hackers then took benefit of Kelp’s distinctive safety configuration, which doesn’t require a number of verifications earlier than approving a transaction. This allowed hackers to siphon funds by way of fraudulent transactions.
The corporate cited “preliminary indicators” pointing to North Korea, particularly a crypto-targeting hacking group referred to as TraderTraitor, because the offender.
Kelp DAO responded to LayerZero and accused them of theft on their behalf.
In recent times, North Korean hackers working for Kim Jong Un’s regime have been extremely profitable in stealing cryptocurrencies. Final yr, North Korean hackers stole greater than $2 billion in cryptocurrencies. The overall quantity of cryptocurrencies stolen by North Korea since 2017 is claimed to be roughly $6 billion.