Actually I based my wild guess at reporting that NPR did a couple of years back regarding different thefts of crypto and that the intelligence community determined it was a hacker group in North Korea that was supported and funded by their own government as a way to get around the sanctions.

My subsequent confirmation came from reading the article, but I already had the same suspicions, however I will admit my error if it indeed turns out it wasn't North Korea (haven't been able to read the links you provided yet)