Expert Traces Stolen DMM Bitcoin Assets

Since early July, over $35 million obtained from the May hack of the cryptocurrency exchange DMM Bitcoin has been laundered through the Cambodian online marketplace Huione Guarantee. This was highlighted by on-chain researcher ZachXBT.

1/4 So far in July 2024 more than $35M from the $305M DMM Bitcoin hack has been laundered to the online marketplace Huione Guarantee

It is suspected that Lazarus Group is behind the hack due to similarities in laundering techniques and off chain indicators. pic.twitter.com/g1ndlttBll

— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) July 14, 2024

According to his data, the hackers initially passed the stolen bitcoins through mixers and then exchanged them for Ethereum and Avalanche via the cross-chain liquidity protocol THORChain.

The assets were subsequently converted into USDT, then into Tron, and finally ended up on Huione Guarantee.

A transfer of $29.6 million to a Huione account was blocked after the stablecoin issuer Tether blacklisted one of the hacker Tron wallets on July 12.

TNVaKWQzau7xL9bcnvLmF9KSEQkWEs4Ug8
Timestamp: 12.07.2024, 23:21:36 UTC
Event: AddedBlackList
Balance: 28,257,162.94 USDT (TRC20)https://t.co/Whl97I1K7m

— USDT/USDC Ban List (@USDTBanList) July 12, 2024

The same address, according to ZachXBT, withdrew about $14 million of the stolen DMM Bitcoin funds over three days.

The researcher also shared 538 wallets involved in the exchange hack.

ZachXBT suggested that the Lazarus Group is behind the incident, “as the money laundering methods and off-chain indicators are similar.”

Earlier, analysts at Elliptic reported that the online marketplace Huione Guarantee processed fraudulent transactions totaling $11 billion.

Back in May, the Japan-based DMM Bitcoin lost $305 million in bitcoins due to a hack.

About a week later, the exchange raised $320 million to compensate users.