NIC Asia Bank

#NICAsiaBank • 2017-09

🇳🇵 Nepal

Group-IB listed Nepal’s NIC Asia Bank among 2017–2018 SWIFT and local interbank transfer incidents in a broader set of Lazarus and Cobalt bank-theft activity. The available linked evidence supports a Nepal bank theft or attempt involving about $4.4 million, but provides limited victim-specific intrusion details beyond its placement in the SWIFT-focused financial-theft timeline.

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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

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