U.S. Indicts Four Men in Scheme to Launder Cryptocurrency for North Korea
WASHINGTON — The Justice Department said on Monday that it had indicted four men on charges of laundering virtual currency stolen by an infamous North Korean online criminal syndicate as part of a far-reaching scheme to buy goods with U.S. dollars and evade international sanctions.
The charges, filed in three cases in federal court in Washington, outline a complex multiyear effort to launder cryptocurrency obtained by the Lazarus Group, an organization linked to espionage, online theft and cyberattacks, including the 2014 breach of Sony Pictures.
The scheme involved a relatively modest amount of currency. But it represents only a fraction of the illegal activity being undertaken by North Korea, officials said — and it vividly demonstrated the creativity and resolve of an isolated country intent on defying demands that it abandon its nuclear weapons and long-range missile programs.
In the first indictment, the government charged a banker based in China, Sim Hyon Sop, 39, along with three cryptocurrency traders with conspiring to convert virtual currency that had been stolen from accounts into dollars. North Korea’s government, short on cash, later used the money to buy goods, including tobacco and communications equipment, in 2018.
Source: The New York Times
