Elliptic Weekly Connect: FBI Confirms North Korea’s Lazarus Group as Hackers Behind $100m Harmony Horizon Bridge Theft
FBI Confirms North Korea’s Lazarus Group as Hackers Behind $100m Harmony Horizon Bridge Theft
The FBI has confirmed that the Lazarus Group – a cyberhacker group backed by North Korea – was behind the June 2022 hack of Harmony’s Horizon Bridge, confirming Elliptic’s attribution of the $100 million hack to North Korea at the time.
Elliptic was the first to identify Lazarus as the culprit after numerous similarities were observed with Lazarus’ past blockchain laundering patterns.
Iran and Russia Exploring Cross-border Stablecoin Settlements
In a move that could have significant implications for sanctions evasion utilizing cryptocurrencies, local Russian news outlets are reporting that Russia and Iran are considering collaboration to skirt international financial and economic restrictions.
News has emerged from Russia indicating that the country intends to partner with Iran to create a stablecoin for use in cross-border trade settlements. The reports suggest that the asset would be gold-backed, and would enable Russia to pay for shipping imports from Iran in the face of severe banking restrictions that both countries face due to sanctions.
European Parliament Postpones MiCA Vote Until April
In a further update to the new timeline for the Markets in Crypto-assets (MiCA) bill, the European Parliament plenary vote has been postponed from February/March to April 2023, due to translating issues.
If the vote proceeds then, the rules should apply around May 2024 for stablecoin issuers and November 2024 for cryptoasset service providers (CASPs).?
Why Regulators Will Scrutinize Banks’ Crypto Exposure in 2023
The collapse of FTX has led observers to raise questions about the state of crypto regulation – resulting in calls for more stringent oversight. It also caused regulators to focus on a particular problem: preventing risks in the cryptoasset space from impacting the banking sector.?
During 2023, regulators and international standard setters will devote increasing attention to scrutinizing banks’ exposure to crypto, and to articulating standards for ensuring that instability in crypto markets does not adversely impact the banking sector. Understanding these developments will be crucial for any banking compliance team.
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The Compliance Implications of FinCEN’s Bitzlato Action
?On January 18th, the US government announced a major enforcement action aimed at disrupting money laundering networks facilitating the illicit use of crypto.?
Join David Carlisle as he explains the significance of FinCEN’s use of this authority, and what it means for compliance teams’ anti-money laundering (AML) efforts.?
What is a… DAO?
Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are tricky to define.? We follow the lead of the Law Commission, which describes them as “a novel type of organizational structure involving multiple participants online, that might rely on a blockchain system, smart contracts, or other software-based systems (which are often open source)”.
We’ve Been Shortlisted!
We are proud to announce that we’ve been shortlisted for Best Blockchain Technology in the Service Provider category for the Hedgeweek US Digital Assets Awards 2023.
Voting is now open, and we would really appreciate it if you voted for us in the Best Blockchain Technology Service Provider category.
From the team
Country guide
Hot off the press is our recently updated country guide for South Korea. Virtual assets are not legal tender here, but the Bank of Korea is reviewing the introduction of a central bank digital currency (CBDC). Click below to find out more.