Seoul accuses North Korea for hacking South Korea chip equipment makers

• South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) reports North Korea’s breach into South Korean chip equipment makers.
• The NIS believes North Korea hacked into the emails of an aide to President Yoon Suk Yeol last year.
• The breach of an aide’s email account resulted from a violation of security regulations.

South Korea’s spy agency has reported that North Korean hackers broke into South Korean chip equipment makers. The National Intelligence Service (NIS) claims that Pyongyang is attempting to produce semiconductors for its weapons programs.

A month after President Yoon Suk Yeol warned that North Korea might stage provocations such as cyber-attacks to interfere with upcoming elections, reports emerged that North Korea hacked into the emails of an aide to President Yoon last year.

“We believe that North Korea might be preparing to produce its semiconductors in the face of difficulties in procuring them due to sanctions,” the NIS said in a statement.

The NIS added that Pyongyang’s efforts could be driven by the need to acquire chips for its weapons programs, including satellites and missiles.

The NIS believes North Korea penetrated the servers of two chip equipment companies in December and February, stealing product designs and photographs of their facilities.

It also cautioned other companies in the chip-making industry to take precautions against cyber-attacks. However, the spy agency did not name the affected firms or suggest that North Korea was able to obtain anything of value.

The NIS stated that North Korean hackers had targeted South Korea’s companies as a key focus since late last year. It believes hackers utilized a technique called “living off the land,” which minimizes malicious codes and utilizes existing, legitimate tools installed within servers, making it challenging to detect with security software.

Last month, President Yoon’s office acknowledged that the breach of an aide’s email account resulted from a violation of security regulations and clarified that its official system had not been hacked.

Seoul has blamed North Korean hackers for stealing large sums of money, often in cryptocurrency, to fund the regime and its nuclear weapons program, although Pyongyang has always denied involvement in cyber crimes. Estimates suggest that North Korea has stolen as much as $3 billion (£2.36 billion) since 2016.

Additionally, experts believe it carries out hacks to steal state secrets, including details of advanced weapons technology. The country, subject to extreme international sanctions, is increasingly becoming more sophisticated in the way it carries out cyber-attacks.