The United States on Monday imposed sanctions on the digital currency mixer Tornado Cash, accusing the service of helping hackers, including those from North Korea, to launder money.
A senior US Treasury Department official said Tornado Cash, one of the largest digital currency “mix” services, has laundered more than $7 billion in digital money since it was created in 2019. second freezes all US assets of the service.
The Lazarus Group, a North Korean government-backed hacking group that has committed numerous data breaches for political and financial reasons, laundered at least $455 million through Tornado Cash, the US Treasury said.
US and South Korean officials say North Korea controls thousands of hackers who steal money, including cryptocurrencies, to fund its weapons programs. Pyongyang denies the allegations.
Representatives for Tornado Cash and the North Korean mission to the United Nations in New York declined to comment.
Tornado Cash was also used to launder about $100 million obtained in an attack on virtual currency firm Harmony in June and, last week, in the theft of virtual currency technology company Nomad, according to the Treasury.
In May, the US Treasury also took aim at the Blender virtual currency mix, imposing sanctions for the first time on such a service.
Digital currency mixers are software tools that group and shuffle cryptocurrencies from thousands of addresses.
“Tornado is an important tool for criminals and hacker groups,” said Tom Robinson, co-founder of cryptocurrency data analytics at Elliptic. “In total, at least $1.3 billion in revenue from crimes such as ransomware, hacks and fraud was laundered through Tornado Cash.”
Source: CNN Brasil
