Millions in Stolen Cryptocurrency Being Laundered by KelpDAO Hackers, Data Reveals

According to on-chain analyst ZachXBT and data from Arkham, the perpetrators of the $290 million KelpDAO heist have initiated the process of laundering their stolen funds. Arkham's data indicates that the wallet controlling the exploit's proceeds made two significant transfers of $117 million and $58 million on the Ethereum blockchain during European hours on Tuesday. ZachXBT has reported that a portion of the stolen cryptocurrency has already started to move across different chains, with approximately $1.5 million being transferred from Ethereum to Bitcoin via Thorchain, and an additional $78,000 routed through the Umbra privacy protocol. Notably, North Korean hacking group Lazarus has previously employed protocols like Thorchain for laundering purposes. The use of cross-chain routing and privacy tools in the early stages of laundering suggests that the attacker may be preparing to further distribute the funds across multiple platforms. The KelpDAO breach is one of the most significant decentralized finance hacks in recent months, triggering a wave of negative sentiment across the DeFi sector and raising concerns about potential contagion to other blockchains. In a related development, Layer 2 network Arbitrum announced on Monday that it had frozen $71 million in ether linked to the hack, a move that could prompt the exploiter to accelerate their efforts to move and launder the remaining funds.