North Korea rejected allegations linking Pyongyang to an estimated $6.3 billion cryptocurrency heist at Binance, dismissing the accusation from the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation as a grave political provocation. Kim Yo Jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, condemned the claims on Tuesday through the state-run Korean Central News Agency.
FBI Blames TraderTraitor Group for Hack
The dispute follows an announcement by the FBI on Saturday attributing the cyberattack on Binance to a hacking operation known as TraderTraitor, according to Yahoo. The bureau stated that the same entity was behind the $1.5 billion Bybit hack in February 2025. Blockchain analytics firms including Elliptic, Chainalysis, and TRM Labs also linked the Binance breach and the subsequent movement of stolen funds to North Korea-linked actors.
Kim Yo Jong dismissed the findings in a written statement. The FBI is trying to brand the DPRK as a ‘cyber criminal state,’ claiming that it obtained information that a hacking organisation ‘supported’ by the DPRK was involved in the incident,
she said, according to The Independent. But the US assertion is absurd rhetoric and nothing new.
She added that the accusation was a grave political provocation against the DPRK that the US misleads international public opinion as if all the cyber crimes in different parts of the world are our deeds,
referring to the country by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
Trackers Trace Billions Across Blockchains
Elliptic reported that in the first four days following the attack, hackers utilized roughly 12,000 wallets across 11 blockchains. Much of the initial laundering occurred on the Tron blockchain before funds were moved to Ethereum through cross-chain bridges, with at least $147 million transferred out of Tron via those bridges.
Hackers also swapped stablecoins on decentralized exchanges into assets that cannot be frozen by their issuers, such as ether. Chainalysis reported that North Korea-linked actors subsequently initiated a new phase of laundering after moving more than $500 million through intermediary wallets on Tron, alongside the first signs of bitcoin mixing.
Binance Resumes Withdrawals and Trading After Asset Freeze
Binance resumed withdrawals and trading after working with issuers to freeze impacted assets. A Binance spokesperson told the BBC on Tuesday that net withdrawals since transactions resumed totaled $4.72 billion, representing a relatively limited portion
of the exchange’s approximately $157 billion in total assets.
The exchange added that it has covered about 95% of the stolen assets from reserves and is working with industry partners to source the remaining 5% of less liquid tokens.
Speaking to reporters on Saturday at a Halloween party at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, Donald Trump adopted a cautious tone regarding the attribution. I’m not concerned. We’re learning about it,
Trump said, adding that the U.S. did not yet know whether North Korea was behind the incident.
Earlier coverage: FBI Blames North Korea for Massive Binance Cyberattack