US Court Uncovers Secret Trail to $1.5B Hack Linked to North Korea Through Bybit Investigation
Ever wonder what it takes to chase down nearly $1.5 billion in crypto stolen by — hold onto your hats — North Korea-linked hackers? Well, Bybit isn’t just sitting on their hands. They’ve just scored a major win in U.S. courts with expedited discovery powers, giving them the ammo to dig deeper into a tangled web of stolen assets that somehow dodged the usual blockchain sleuthing tricks. But here’s the twist: over 90% of those ill-gotten gains have slipped through the cracks of traceability thanks to mixers and cross-chain bridges, turning what once seemed a hopeful hunt into a high-stakes digital game of hide and seek. It’s part legal warfare, part cyber-thriller — and with Bybit locking horns against the Reconnaissance General Bureau and its Lazarus Group enablers, the saga is far from over. Fancy a backstage pass to this crypto cat-and-mouse chase? LEARN MORE.
United States court records unsealed on Thursday show that a federal judge backed crypto exchange Bybit’s effort to trace assets stolen in the $1.5 billion North Korea-linked hack by granting the company expedited discovery.
According to the records, Bybit filed the lawsuit under seal on June 18 against North Korea, its Reconnaissance General Bureau, the Lazarus Group and 20 unidentified defendants. The court granted Bybit’s request for expedited discovery on June 19.
The discovery authority gives Bybit a practical route to identify alleged intermediaries and pursue a small portion of stolen assets that remains traceable, rather than relying solely on a judgment against North Korea.
In its complaint, Bybit alleged that some traceable assets reached exchanges operating or maintaining infrastructure in the US. The company sought account-holder identities, balances and transaction histories, saying certain platforms had indicated they would cooperate after receiving a court order.
Bybit says 90% of stolen funds became untraceable
Bybit also obtained a temporary restraining order on June 19 preventing the unidentified defendants from transferring certain traceable assets. The court renewed the order on July 16 and partially granted Bybit’s request for a preliminary injunction on July 30. Some exhibits and other records remain sealed.
As of the June 18 filing, Bybit said 90.2% of the stolen assets had become untraceable after passing through mixers, cross-chain bridges and over-the-counter dealers. The remaining 9.8% had been traced to identifiable wallets, including 5.3% of the total, about $75.5 million, that had been frozen or recovered.
The figures mark a sharp drop from more than a year ago, when Bybit CEO Ben Zhou said at the time that 68.57% of the funds remained traceable.
Related: Bybit made ‘slow but steady comeback’ in 2025 after massive hack: CoinGecko
The hack occured on Feb. 21, 2025, after attackers compromised Safe Wallet’s infrastructure. Forensic investigators said compromised credentials belonging to a Safe developer allowed the attackers to inject malicious code into its cloud infrastructure. The FBI attributed the theft to North Korea on Feb. 26, 2025.
The lawsuit shows that Bybit is seeking the return of the stolen assets, approximately $1.5 billion in compensatory damages, punitive damages and treble damages under the US Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.
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