North Korean developers gain access to Waves Wallet code repository, maliciously submitting or stealing user Private Keys.

[Chain News] On June 19, it was reported that a North Korean developer gained elevated permissions in the Keeper-Wallet codebase of Waves Protocol. The account “AhegaoXXX” has been pushing updates to the dormant codebase since May 2025, and this account has been confirmed to be associated with a North Korean IT outsourcing organization. Code review revealed that a certain submission added functionality to send wallet logs and runtime errors to an external database, potentially stealing mnemonic phrases and Private Keys. Although this branch has not been merged, the attacker has released six malicious NPM packages that had not been updated for a long time by controlling the account of former Waves engineer Maxim Smolyakov.

The security report indicates that this incident shows North Korean hackers shifting from ordinary outsourcing infiltration to direct control of code repositories. It is recommended that development teams strengthen supply chain protection, including auditing contributor permissions, cleaning up dormant accounts, and monitoring repository redirection. Currently, the download volume of the affected software is low, but there is a risk of credential leakage for Waves users updating the Keeper-Wallet.