According to ISNA, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) announced Sunday that it has formally linked the theft of approximately $6 billion in digital assets from Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, to North Korea. ISNA reported that FBI officials said the attack was carried out by a group affiliated with the North Korean state.
Hamshahri's report recalled the events preceding this announcement: according to the article, Binance had previously been targeted by a cyberattack in which $1.7 billion in user assets were stolen; the FBI's new disclosure raised the incident's scale to approximately $6 billion. Hamshahri noted that Binance founder Changpeng Zhao confirmed the exchange had been targeted by a cyberattack, and that Tether and Circle froze approximately $1.8 billion in assets to prevent hacker access.
Iran International's report also cited Binance's own statement: the exchange said it had compensated 90 percent of the $6.3 billion in stolen assets from its own reserves. According to the same source, the FBI linked the attack to a North Korea state-backed group. A separate Iran International article noted that following this attack of unclear magnitude, other cryptocurrency exchanges have tightened security measures and called for faster information sharing, with this breach exposing security gaps in the sector amid crypto's growing integration into the financial system.
How the Persian press covered it
| Source (orientation) | Headline / framing |
|---|---|
| ISNA (Semi-official) | Reports the FBI's formal statement plainly; cites the amount as "approximately $6 billion." |
| Hamshahri (Moderate-traditionalist) | Narrates the event chronologically alongside the earlier $1.7 billion hack. |
| Iran International (Opposition, diaspora) | Cites the amount as "$6.3 billion"; includes Binance's own compensation claim and the sector's security response. |
Among the sources, there is a minor discrepancy in the total stolen: while ISNA and Hamshahri report "$6 billion," Iran International states "$6.3 billion"—a difference that may stem from estimates at different stages of the incident, and the exact figure has not been confirmed in public sources.
Context
Hacker groups linked to North Korea targeting major cryptocurrency exchanges is not a new tactic; U.S. authorities have previously attributed billions of dollars in cryptocurrency thefts to North Korea-affiliated groups like Lazarus. Such attacks are considered an important revenue channel for the Pyongyang regime, whose access to foreign currency has been restricted by international sanctions.
The scale of the Binance incident far exceeds previous examples, bringing security gaps in cryptocurrency exchange infrastructure back into focus. Binance's compensation of the bulk of stolen assets from its own reserves can be read as a step to preserve user confidence; yet this does not change the fact that the exchange's own security systems failed to prevent the attack. The FBI's formal attribution strengthens international concerns that North Korea continues to pursue cryptocurrency theft as a state-backed strategy.
For information only; not investment advice.
