These days, the most dangerous thing isn’t a candlestick chart—it’s an interview invitation for a “high-paying remote job.”
On October 27, Binance said its security team had identified and blocked several cyberattacks linked to North Korea over the past week. The company’s systems were not compromised, and no assets were lost (as reported by ChainCatcher, TechFlow, Wu Shuo, and others, citing Binance).
The tactic isn’t new. It’s called a “Contagious Interview.” The basic setup is this: someone posing as a recruiter for an AI or crypto company invites you to an interview, then gives you a “coding test” or asks you to install software to “fix” a video call. You think you’re showing off your skills, but you’re actually running the attacker’s malware yourself.
The group’s track record is backed by official figures. On September 18, agencies including the U.S. FBI, Japan’s National Police Agency, and authorities in Australia and Germany issued a joint warning, identifying the group as WaterPlum: from around December 2025 to July 2026, at least 30,000 devices across more than 100 countries were compromised, funds or credentials were stolen from over 7,000 crypto wallets, and at least $10.71 million in crypto assets flowed to North Korea (according to VOA).
So when Binance says it “stopped” the attack, I’d rather take it as a warning: attacks are now targeting exchange employees, and ordinary developers and retail investors are even more likely to get caught out.
A few practical tips from me:
1. If an unfamiliar recruiter asks you to run code locally or install a plugin, stop right there.
2. If you really need to do a test, use an isolated virtual machine or another computer. Don’t run it on your main computer, where you keep your $BTC $ETH wallets and seed phrases.
3. If someone says during a video interview, “It won’t open—download this repair tool,” you can pretty much block them immediately.
Binance says it will continue strengthening security monitoring and internal controls. As for us, all we can do is make sure one interview task doesn’t take our wallets along with it.
This is not investment advice.