North Korea-Linked Actors Allegedly Use AI Executive Deepfakes in Zoom Phishing Targeting Web3 Employee

June 22, 2025

An alarming incident involves North Korean actors utilizing deepfake technology allegedly generated by AI to deceive a Web3 employee during a fake Zoom call. The target was tricked into downloading macOS malware disguised as a 'Zoom extension', leading to the deployment of spyware, a keylogger, and a crypto wallet stealer. The attackers reportedly employed Telegram and spoofed Zoom domains to orchestrate this breach, showcasing the risks posed by ungoverned AI practices.

This incident underscores the importance of Project Cerebellum's efforts in establishing guardrails for trustworthy AI. Join us in shaping a future where responsible AI governance helps prevent such harmful incidents: JOIN US

For those interested, this incident maps to HISPI Project Cerebellum TAIM, specifically the 'Govern' function, emphasizing the need for robust AI governance frameworks.

Matched TAIM controls

Suggested mapping from embedding similarity (not a formal assessment). Browse all TAIM controls

Alleged deployer
north-korea, lazarus-group, bluenoroff, government-of-north-korea
Alleged developer
unknown-voice-cloning-technology-developers, unknown-deepfake-technology-developers
Alleged harmed parties
zoom, web3, unnamed-web3-employee, truth, national-security-and-intelligence-stakeholders, macos-users, epistemic-integrity, cryptocurrency-infrastructure

Source

Data from the AI Incident Database (AIID). Cite this incident: https://incidentdatabase.ai/cite/1117

Data source

Incident data is from the AI Incident Database (AIID).

When citing the database as a whole, please use:

McGregor, S. (2021) Preventing Repeated Real World AI Failures by Cataloging Incidents: The AI Incident Database. In Proceedings of the Thirty-Third Annual Conference on Innovative Applications of Artificial Intelligence (IAAI-21). Virtual Conference.

Pre-print on arXiv · Database snapshots & citation guide

We use weekly snapshots of the AIID for stable reference. For the official suggested citation of a specific incident, use the “Cite this incident” link on each incident page.