Unfortunately, we are in an era where even hackers are controlled by governments; not all of them, of course, but some are. I say this because last year, in the
Bybit case, where hackers stole US$1.4 billion in ETH,
the FBI accused hackers working for North Korea.
In the
DMM Bitcoin exchange case, which happened in 2024 and hackers stole US$308 million in Bitcoin, investigations revealed it was a
North Korean hacker group.
The KuCoin case, where US$281 million in cryptocurrencies were stolen, also points to
North Korean hackers, as can be seen in this article:
https://crystalintelligence.com/investigations/the-10-biggest-crypto-hacks-in-history/I'm posting this to say the following: even if a billion-dollar reward is offered for finding those responsible for this misfortune affecting so many people, it might still not be possible to punish the culprits. Because if they are North Korean hackers...
no other government will catch them in North Korea, and I highly doubt that North Korean hackers would act without orders from the North Korean government.
They would probably quickly send everything they stole to the Korean government if they are Korean hackers behind this crime.They are doing bad activities under command of North Korean government but it's understandable that in a nation with dictator like Kim Jong Un, if you don't do what he want, he will kill you, even your family. Perhaps not all people in Lazarus group are bad people or actually want to do such hacks but they have to do that for their individual safety and their family safety.
Rightly, what they do are not things to be proud of and I believe they only can stop doing that if they leave North Korea, but let's consider how?
With money they hacked, no governments in other nations can get it back and anytime hacked money from Lazarus are used in any mixers, big problems will come with that mixers.
The only prevention mixers or no KYC exchanges can do is filtering and blacklisting funds from Lazarus but there are always chances for mistakes.