FBI says $1.2 billion stolen from Binance by North Korea has been recovered

The FBI said on Thursday that it was able to seize more than $1.2 billion of the more than $6 billion in cryptocurrency that was reported stolen last month from Binance, the world's largest crypto exchange. 

The agency said that to begin recovering the stolen funds, it had conducted coordinated actions against the North Korean government's schemes that allowed it to steal billions in cryptocurrency. 

“North Korea’s government bankrolls its rogue regime and illicit weapons program through cryptocurrency theft,” M. Scott Proctor, principal deputy assistant attorney general for national security, said in a statement. 

More than $2.7 billion of the stolen funds were frozen by the U.S. government and private sectors, and the Justice Department announced Thursday that it had court authorization to seize or restrain more than $1.2 billion of the frozen funds. 

The Justice Department said that efforts to trace, freeze, seize and forfeit the stolen virtual assets are ongoing.