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A technical cybersecurity alert jointly written
by four different federal agencies, including the Treasury
Department and FBI, said there had been a resurgence in
financially motivated hacking efforts by the North Korean regime
this year after a lull in activity.
“Since February 2020, North Korea has resumed targeting banks in
multiple countries to initiate fraudulent international money
transfers and ATM cash outs,” the warning reads.
U.S. law enforcement titled the hacking campaign “Fast Cash” and
blamed North Korea’s Reconnaissance General Bureau, a spy
agency, for it. They described the operation as going on since
at least 2016 but ramping up in sophistication and volume
recently.
Over the last several years, North Korea has been blamed by U.S.
authorities and private sector cybersecurity companies for
hacking numerous banks in Asia, South America and Africa.
“North Korean cyber actors have demonstrated an imaginative
knack for adjusting their tactics to exploit the financial
sector as well as any other sector through illicit cyber
operations,” Bryan Ware, a senior cybersecurity official at the
U.S. Homeland Security Department, said in a prepared statement.
Cybersecurity experts and foreign policy analysts have said
these types of hacking operations are conducted to help fund the
North Korean government, which is cash-strapped due to expansive
sanctions continuously placed on it by the U.S. and other
western countries.
"The continued attacks are proof of the reliance the regime has
on these funds, along with being a testament to their technical
ability and determination," said Vikram Thakur, a technical
director for U.S. cybersecurity firm Symantec.
(Reporting by Christopher Bing; Editing by Tom Brown)
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