Hackers working for the North Korean government have stolen more than $2 billion in crypto so far this year, According to blockchain analysis firm Elliptic,
on tuesday, elliptical published a blog post With this new estimate, which the company says is “the largest annual total on record, there are still three months to go,” and is based on more than 30 hacks this year.
The previous record was in 2022, when North Korea stole $1.35 billion. The total amount of crypto stolen since 2017 is at least $6 billion, according to Elliptical, which said the figure could still be lower.
“The real figure may be even higher. Admitting cyber theft is not an exact science for North Korea,” the blog post reads.
“We are aware of several other thefts that share some of the hallmarks of North Korea-linked activity, but lack sufficient evidence to definitively attribute responsibility. Other thefts are likely unreported and remain unknown,” Elliptic said.
The company said North Korea’s main targets are still crypto exchanges, but the regime’s hackers are also starting to target “high-net-worth individuals” who hold large amounts of crypto.
And this isn’t the only recent change, the company said.
“The majority of hacks in 2025 will end up being through social engineering attacks, where hackers tricked or manipulated individuals to gain access to cryptocurrency,” read the blog post. “This marks a change from earlier attacks where in many cases technical flaws in the crypto infrastructure were exploited to steal funds. This shift highlights that the weak point in cryptocurrency security is increasingly human rather than technical.”
Elliptical’s estimate seems to be in line with other organizations. last year, The United Nations Security Council estimates Between 2017 and 2023, North Korean hackers stole $3 billion in cryptocurrency. Adding up Elliptical’s estimates of this year’s $2 billion, and last years’ $742.8 million, the total gets closer to the $6 billion figure.
The governments of Japan, South Korea and the United States accused North Korean hackers of stealing more than $659 million in 2024, roughly the same figure as Ellipsis.
united nations believe that The regime led by Kim Jong-un uses stolen crypto to fund its nuclear weapons program.
This year’s record was fueled mostly by the massive theft of more than $1.4 billion from crypto exchange Bybit, which the FBI and several blockchain monitoring firms and researchers attributed to North Korea.
Other victims of North Korean hackers in the crypto world over the years are play-to-earn game Axie Infinity ($625 million in 2022), crypto startup Harmony ($100 million in 2022), and crypto exchange Wazirx ($235 million in 2024), among many others.
