As it bristled at U.S. accusations over a massive crypto heist, North Korea staged a fresh show of force — test-firing strategic cruise missiles while denouncing the FBI’s claim that Pyongyang-linked hackers stole $6 billion from cryptocurrency platform Binance.
The missile test followed a pointed rebuttal from Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of leader Kim Jong Un, who described the FBI’s allegation as a “grave political provocation”.
On Saturday, the FBI said the hack was carried out by TraderTraitor, a hacking group it identified as affiliated with North Korea.
Specialists say the incident could rank as the biggest cryptocurrency theft ever recorded. The estimated take amounts to “nearly a quarter of the DPRK’s estimated annual GDP,” Michael Bosack, founding director of the Parley Policy Institute and a former UN Command official, told journalists.
Kim Yo Jong dismissed the accusation as “absurd rhetoric and nothing new,” pointing to earlier U.S. assertions that North Korea was responsible for last year’s high-profile hack of Bybit.
Even so, Mr Bosack said Pyongyang likely judged a response necessary because of the “level of international attention on the incident”.
He argued the denial was also designed to keep open the routes North Korea could use to launder and spend any stolen cryptocurrency.
“If external parties start closing doors based on the international heat on the matter, then the stolen cryptocurrency does nothing to support the Kim regime’s near-term priorities,” he said.
A 2024 United Nations report said revenues from North Korean cyberattacks had “reportedly helped to fund the country’s development of weapons of mass destruction”.
‘Double deterrence’
KCNA, North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency, said the launch involved strategic cruise missiles equipped with a new cluster-munition warhead.
“The middle-sized dispersal warhead tipped on the cruise missile is capable of turning into ashes a target area of 5 to 6 hectares with its highest-density power,” KCNA said.
The agency said the test “perfected the capability to deliver a vertical strike against the target by improving the terminal maneuverability of the cruise missile”.
KCNA quoted a North Korean official as saying the launch was carried out “because our armed forces should defend the security of the country and deter all sorts of threats.”
Lim Eul-chul, a professor at the Institute for Far Eastern Studies at Kyungnam University, told AFP the test appeared meant to underscore an ability to cripple “key South Korean and US military infrastructure, including airfield runways, radar bases, air defence batteries and assembled troops, with a single cruise missile”.
He added that the move also sought to create a “double deterrence against South Korea by strengthening conventional asymmetric strike capabilities at a stage before the use of nuclear weapons”.
The nuclear-armed North has recently tested a variety of systems, including attack drones, a new precision-guided torpedo system and an intermediate-range hypersonic missile.
South Korea’s military did not disclose the cruise missile launch, just as it also did not publicize Sunday’s test.
Unlike ballistic missile activity, North Korean cruise missile tests are not barred under UN Security Council sanctions.
Responding to questions about the reported launch, Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesperson Jang Do-young said South Korea and the United States were “closely coordinating and conducting a highly detailed analysis of its characteristics and specifications”.
“Our military does not announce all projectiles launched by North Korea,” Mr Jang said, citing operational security and the need to protect intelligence assets.
