Image provided by FBI
reporter kelly ann
The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) announced on the 12th that a North Korean-backed hacker group used fake video calls to steal people's personal information and steal more than $400 million in crypto assets.
According to the FBI, more than 900 people have fallen victim to what the agency calls the "Face Stealer" scam in the past 18 months.
"The North Korean regime has used the proceeds of massive cryptocurrency theft to fund its illegal weapons program, stealing billions of dollars in recent years," said Brett Leatherman, head of the FBI's cyber division.
In October, a major hack of cryptocurrency trading giant Binance resulted in the theft of digital assets worth $6.3 billion (approximately 1 trillion yen). Binance previously announced that the hackers staged a fake job interview to carry out the theft.
American law enforcement agencies have determined that the cyberattack, the largest hacking incident in history, was carried out by actors with ties to North Korea. North Korea denies this claim.
U.S. authorities say the latest scam, known as a "face stealer," is "actively targeting" people working in areas such as cryptocurrencies and Web3 (a decentralized internet using blockchain technology), particularly those involved in the development and maintenance of open source software.
Hackers use fake or compromised social media accounts to call their targets into "fake versions" of web conferencing services such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet, according to the FBI and Justice Department.
The hackers then play a recorded video of someone the target knows who has fallen prey to the scam in the past, making the call appear legitimate. However, it makes it appear that there is a problem with the audio.
A message will then appear on the victim's web conference screen asking them to click on a link to "fix" the audio. This "fix" downloads malware to the victim's device, giving the hacker access to their contact list and apps, and making more people a potential target.
U.S. authorities say the hackers secretly recorded phone calls with their targets and used those recordings as material to defraud new targets.
The FBI describes Face Stealer as a "highly effective social engineering technique that can fool even the most experienced, technically and security-savvy computer users."
"This exploits the trust we have in a universal videoconferencing platform and the personal relationships we value," Patrick Grundy, deputy director of the FBI's Los Angeles field office, said in a statement Wednesday.
"If you can't imagine a situation in which you might be the victim, you're not thinking creatively enough."
(English article: North Korean hackers used fake video calls in $400m crypto hack, says FBI)
