China has emerged in recent decades as a critical enabler of North Korea’s cyber operations. One indicted North Korean hacker, Park Jin Hyok, reportedly worked for a few years in Dalian. Credit: FBI
When Lazarus, the notorious North Korean hacker group, needs help, it knows where to turn. Whether it wants to find a place to station hackers, hire money launderers to funnel stolen money from cyber attacks, or even link up to the internet within North Korea, the cybercriminal group looks to its trusty accomplice: China.
Lazarus is not alone. China has emerged in recent decades as a critical enabler of North Korea’s cyber operations, which include hacks of Japan’s Sony Entertainment in 2014 and the Bangladesh central bank in 2016, as well as the WannaCry 2.0 attack, which crippled global computer systems in 2017. Even though this assistance is not all explicitly state-sanctioned, experts say the Chinese authorities have displayed little willingness to crack down on North Korea’s activities.
For the U.S. government, China’s role in these attacks is a concern. “North Korea’s malicious activity, including the theft of millions of dollars, is outlier activity for a natio
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