Millions in Stolen Cryptocurrency Being Laundered by KelpDAO Hackers

According to ZachXBT, a blockchain investigator, and data from Arkham, the perpetrators of the $290 million KelpDAO heist have initiated the laundering process of their illicitly obtained funds. On Tuesday, during European hours, Arkham detected two significant transactions on the Ethereum blockchain, totaling $117 million and $58 million, originating from the wallet controlling the exploit proceeds. ZachXBT has also reported that a subset of the stolen funds is being transferred across different blockchains, with approximately $1.5 million being bridged 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 utilized Thorchain for similar money laundering activities. The employment of cross-chain transactions and privacy tools in the initial 'layering' phase of money laundering suggests that the attacker is 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 widespread negative sentiment and concerns about potential contagion effects on other blockchains. In response to the hack, Arbitrum, a layer 2 network, announced on Monday that it had frozen $71 million in ether linked to the breach, a move that may pressure the hacker to expedite the transfer and laundering of the remaining funds.