Poloniex hacker launders $3.4 million via Tornado Cash mixer

The hacker responsible for last year’s Poloniex hack has transferred 1,100 ETH, valued at around $3.4 million, to the U.S.-sanctioned cryptocurrency mixer Tornado Cash in an attempt to launder the stolen funds, according to on-chain data from security firm PeckShield.

Poloniex was drained of $100 million during an attack on one of its hot wallets in November last year. Mixing services like Tornado Cash are often used by cybercriminals to obfuscate the trail of stolen cryptocurrency.

This attack is widely considered to be the work of the North Korean Lazarus Group, a notorious state-sponsored hacking organization that has previously executed high-profile attacks, including a $600 million hack on the Ronin sidechain.

In a previous on-chain message, Poloniex offered the attacker a 5% bounty, approximately $5 million, to return the remaining 95% of the stolen funds.

Poloniex has been a centralized exchange since its launch in 2014 and was acquired by Tron founder Justin Sun in 2019.

In a separate transaction involving Tornado Cash, an attacker linked to a $26 million hack on Kronos Research transferred 200 ETH to the mixer today, PeckShield noted.

Notably, Kronos Research also fell victim to the attack in November last year, though it remains unclear if the two incidents are directly connected.