Guatemalan Financial Institution

#GuatemalanFI • 2015-12

🇬🇹 Guatemala

In December 2015, attackers stole about $16 million from a Guatemalan financial institution. Carnegie’s financial-sector timeline and UN Panel reporting identify the case as a high-confidence DPRK-affiliated financial theft, but the linked evidence does not provide public victim-specific intrusion details.

Related Actors

Bluenoroff

Kaspersky

Bluenoroff is Kaspersky's name for a financially motivated unit within the broader Lazarus formation. Kaspersky introduced the designation publicly in 2017 while documenting bank intrusions connected to the 2016 Bangladesh Central Bank theft and other attacks on financial institutions and SWIFT-connected systems. The group used watering holes, backdoors, compromised infrastructure, and malware tailored to banking environments, with activity spanning multiple countries. By 2022, Kaspersky described a shift from banks and SWIFT servers toward cryptocurrency businesses as the group's principal source of illicit income. Operators created convincing cryptocurrency software companies and applications, delivered backdoored updates, and used malicious documents and social engineering to abuse trust. The reporting portrays Bluenoroff as able to draw on the larger formation's malware, exploits, and infrastructure while maintaining a distinct financial objective.

Lazarus Under The Hood
First seen: 2017-04 • Last seen: 2026-07

Related Reports

« Back