Ethereum Tokens Swiped, Returned After South Korean Tax Service Publishes Wallet Seed Phrases
South Korea’s National Tax Service accidentally published wallet recovery phrases for seized crypto in a press release photo; tokens were moved and later returned.
South Korea’s National Tax Service (NTS) published unredacted photos in a press release that revealed recovery seed phrases for seized cryptocurrency wallets, allowing anyone with the phrases to access the accounts [1][3].
Within hours of the publication, an unknown actor transferred roughly 4 million Ethereum-based tokens, nominally worth about $4.8 million, from the seized wallets; the assets were subsequently returned to the wallets [2][3][1].
The incident drew criticism as a serious operational-security lapse and highlighted risks governments face when handling self-custodied digital assets without strong technical safeguards [3][4].
Authorities and observers described the episode as a demonstration of the consequences of exposing private recovery data, underscoring the need for tighter custody controls for seized crypto [3][1].
Anonymous signal used only for weekly cluster rankings. No public counters.
Share
Broadcast this coverage
Copy-ready links for the networks your audience checks first.
Support independent reporting
If this summary helped, a small tip helps keep ClusterWire running.
Privacy note: we log tip UI events (page + action, and article slug when applicable) to improve the feature. We don’t store IP address, user-agent, or wallet addresses in analytics. Tips are on-chain, so the sending address is public in the transaction.
Citations
Follow the primary reporting behind this analysis. Click a citation to open the referenced source in a new tab.
- 3South Korea National Tax Service’s Mistake Resulted In $4.8 Million Crypto LossCryptoNews• Feb 27, 2026
- 4South Korea Tax Agency Accidentally Exposes Crypto Recovery PhraseLive Bitcoin News• Feb 27, 2026
Themes
Themes driving this story
Curated from the cluster of sources powering this article.