The US Department of Justice announced on Thursday its charges against an alleged North Korean hacker. The criminal complaint specifically charges Park Jin Hyok with wire and computer fraud which he reportedly committed in behalf of the Kim Jong-Un government. This marks the first time for the US Justice Department to bring such charges against a Pyongyang operative.
According to the report from the New York Times, the hermit kingdom has long been suspected to engage in hacking activities in American companies while stealing from major financial institutions around the world.
A 174-page document detailing the DOJ's criminal complaint revealed how internet hackers have become responsible in causing irreparable financial damages to several companies and to the global economy as a whole.
In the text, Park was directly charged with both fraudulent acts in the 2014 massive hacking of Sony Pictures Entertainment, the 2017 WannaCry ransomware strain, and the 2016 Bangladesh online bank heist.
According to Wired, the NoKor programmer is suspected of being responsible not only in the aforementioned illegal cyberoperations from 2014 but also for other web criminal activities happening up to these days.
Citing the formal complaint, the DOJ reiterated that the damages caused by these computer intrusions are "virtually unparalleled" and beyond compare.
Although the document particularly pointed out Park's name, DOJ prosecutors reportedly believe that he had some support to successfully carry out the offensive web operations. Given the scale of the crime, it's hardly surprising that the justice department mentioned this fact.
As further specified by CBS News, Park was under the employment of a certain Chosun Expo Joint Venture which is suspected to be a corporate front of the North Korean government.
The accused allegedly worked for CEJV, which was headquartered then in China, for more than two years before returning to his homeland which, in part, coincided with the time that the Sony Entertainment hacking debacle exploded.
Limitations of the Complaint
The report from Wired further explained why Park was the only person of interest mentioned in the complaint paper. According to the media outlet, the issue of cybersecurity investigation is currently too complicated for any judicial bodies, such as the US DOJ, to tread on. This makes it nearly impossible to implicate a group or even a country to the accusations.
As stipulated by cyberspace analysts, Park's direct implication to the crime is caused by a mishap in the operation. Tracing back this mistake to an individual is quite difficult, much more in tying it back to an organization or country.
