Altcoins
WazirX Hackers Converted About $150 Million Worth of Altcoins to ETH
WazirX hackers, who claim to be part of the North Korean Lazarus group, converted the altcoins in their loot into ETH. Wallet activity shows that $90.2 million worth of SHIB, $10.2 million worth of MATIC, and about $7.5 million worth of PEPE were exchanged for ETH.
Like the hack concludedbad actors held $52 million in ETH. Now, that amount has grown to $201 million after the conversions. Spot On Chain, an on-chain analytics firm, published on X, “The total $ETH outfit of #WazirX the operator has increased to 59,097 $ETH(201 million dollars)!” He added: “The operator has not taken the following steps with these $ETH and only owns about $12 million in altcoins such as $CHR, $CELR, $OOKIAnd $BEFORE.”
The reason behind the ETH conversions comes from the fact that many altcoins have the blacklisting feature in case of theft, which makes it easier to track funds from criminal activities. For example, USDT has this feature, which Tether uses to comply with authorities. Several other centralized altcoins do this as well.
However, this is not the case with ETH. Converting the stolen funds into ETH is therefore the most sensible solution for an easy escape. Furthermore, ETH’s massive liquidity and relatively high stability ensure that hackers can switch between positions without fear of volatility reducing the value of their loot.
Converting the stolen assets often involves hackers covering their tracks by using mixing services like Tornado Cash or selling them for fiat currencies on centralized exchanges (CEXs) without adequate anti-money laundering (AML) controls. Nonetheless, the hacker still holds around $12 million in altcoins, including CHR, CELR, OOKI, and FRONT.
WazirX insured The company told its users that it was “sparing no effort to locate and recover the funds.” It added: “We are in contact with the best resources to assist us in this endeavor. While these are the findings of our preliminary investigation, we will keep you informed of further updates.”