North Korean Crypto Stealing Campaign Rears Its Head Again
2025-07-31 • Veracode •
https://www.veracode.com/blog/north-korean-crypto-stealing-campaign-again/
Veracode identified twelve malicious npm packages tied to a persistent North Korean crypto-stealing campaign that targets developers through interview-style exercises. The packages used typosquatting and cloned legitimate-looking content, then executed obfuscated JavaScript from postinstall hooks, hidden node_modules paths, license files, or test-time execution paths. Deobfuscated payloads showed Beavertail variants with cross-platform support for system profiling, crypto wallet and browser-extension theft, sensitive-file exfiltration, second-stage downloads, Python execution, shell-command handling, and sandbox evasion. The activity reused port 1224, C2 infrastructure, encryption material, and code patterns across packages, while also showing possible overlap or competition from another actor through a bolted-on npoint.io configuration. The campaign matters because it combines software-supply-chain abuse with DPRK-linked job-interview lures to steal cryptocurrency and developer secrets that could enable broader corporate access.
Indicators of Compromise
| Type | Value | First Seen | Last Seen |
|---|---|---|---|
| IPv4 | 144.172.105.235 | 2025-07-31 | 2026-01-21 |
| IPv4 | 144.172.106.7 | 2025-07-31 | 2026-01-21 |
| IPv4 | 144.172.109.98 | 2025-07-31 | 2026-01-21 |
| IPv4 | 45.61.165.45 | 2025-07-31 | 2026-01-21 |
| IPv4 | 45.61.128.61 | 2025-07-31 | 2026-01-21 |
| IPv4 | 135.181.123.177 | 2025-04-11 | 2025-10-16 |
| HASH | 1c7631aca0c00365e8a7e68dd11045e… | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |
| HASH | f11e5d193372b6986b7333c0367ed23… | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |
| HASH | cf17723e776e880802357825a8a139d6 | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |
| HASH | 0123456789abcdef0123456789abcdef | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |
| URL | https://api.npoint.io/e5a5e32cd… | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |
| IPv4 | 144.172.104.10 | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |
| IPv4 | 45.61.150.67 | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |
| IPv4 | 95.216.46.218 | 2025-07-31 | 2025-07-31 |