Kim Jong Un ‘kept in power by HACKER army that funds nuclear weapons and economy’

NORTH Korea’s supreme leader Kim Jong Un has been using hackers to help the country’s failing economy and fund nuclear weapons, reports say.

According to a report conducted by the U.S. Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency, North Korea’s government has partook in a number of “malicious cyber activities.”

APKim Jong Un uses a cyberarmy of hackers to prop North Korea’s economy up[/caption]

The list of illegal cybercrimes included targeting banks worldwide, stealing defense secrets, extorting money via ransomware, hijacking digitally mined currency, and laundering cryptocurrency.

“North Korea’s cyber program poses a growing espionage, theft, and attack threat,” the report stated.

The report added: “North Korea has conducted cybertheft against financial institutions and cryptocurrency exchanges worldwide, potentially stealing hundreds of millions of dollars, probably to fund government priorities, such as its nuclear and missile programs.”

Kim’s regime, which just marked 10 years this month, has already raked in at least $2.3 billion through illegal cyber activity, with more funds likely on the way, the U.S. and UN investigators said.

At least $316.4 million of that figure came from a malware called AppleJeus, which fronts as a cryptocurrency trading platform but actually steals money from its users.

In 2020, theft through cybercrime accounted for about 8% of North Korea’s estimated economy, according to the Bank of Korea in Seoul.

After Kim decided to shut down North Korea’s borders because of Covid-19, the country was forced to halt what minuscule legal trade they participated in.

North Korea’s economy is currently the worst it has been in two decades after being inundated with sanctions for years.

The sanctions were imposed by several countries following North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile testing.

As an attempt to evade the limitations of the imposed sanctions, North Korea has resorted to its cyberarmy of hackers to grow its GDP.

In one instance, the cyberarmy attempted to steal $2 billion from the Swift (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) system of financial transactions, according to Bloomberg.

The country has also tried using illegally-obtained military technology for financial gain, according to the UN Security Council.

North Korea “is not afraid to be brazen and destructive in order to achieve the task at hand,” says Jenny Jun, a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Cyber Statecraft Initiative.

“The fight against North Korea’s illicit activities is like a whack-a-mole game—cracking down will lead to displacement rather than cause [the regime] to stop or focus on legitimate economic activity,” Jun added.

North Korea’s cyberarmy has participated in a number of illicit activities, according to US and UN investigators

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