Hackers Stole $20 Million from US Government Crypto Wallets
Date: 2024-10-25 Author: Henry Casey Categories: IN WORLD
According to data from the Arkham analytics platform, unknown hackers may have stolen about $20 million in cryptocurrency, including Ethereum, Tether, and Circle USD Coin, that was seized by the government. These funds were controlled from government addresses, which experts now believe may have been attacked.
This version is supported by the well-known crypto investigator ZachXBT, who noted on Telegram that the stolen assets may include funds confiscated from the hackers behind the Bitfinex hack. Arkham claims that the address 0xc9E received the seized assets from at least one of the wallets mentioned in the Bitfinex court documents.
In 2016, hackers Ilya Lichtenstein and his partner, rapper Heather Morgan, known as Razzlekhan, stole about $8 billion in bitcoin from the Bitfinex exchange. Nearly a decade later, federal prosecutors have called for a five-year prison term for Lichtenstein.
Recent suspicious transactions show that the attackers began selling and laundering the stolen funds after hacking US government wallets. In a post on October 24, Arkham reported that the assets were transferred to the address 0x348, where they began converting them into Ethereum. Experts speculate that the criminals have already begun laundering the money through suspicious addresses associated with the laundering service.
Earlier, Arkham analysts noted that the US government withdrew more than $6.5 million in cryptocurrency from the decentralized lending platform Aave. Etherscan data also showed that one government address paid up to $1,000 in Ethereum fees to move approximately $100,000 in cryptocurrency.
