South Korea is facing a real security scandal in handling seized digital assets. The government has just announced an urgent review of all cryptocurrency storage protocols after a security disaster occurred when the National Tax Service accidentally leaked a full wallet recovery phrase. The result? About 4 million PRTG tokens were transferred from the seized wallet immediately after the leak. On paper, the value looks significant—about $4.8 million—but PRTG’s actual liquidity is extremely limited, reflecting the core problem in managing these assets.

What’s surprising is that someone reported to the police just one day later, saying they accessed the funds after seeing the exposed phrase and returned the assets. Authorities are now investigating whether all PRTG tokens have already been returned. This is not an isolated incident—South Korea has been dealing with a long string of failures in managing digital assets. Since January, multiple losses of seized coins have been reported, including 22 bitcoins that disappeared from a vault at the Gangan police station headquarters. There are also recorded losses at local offices of the public prosecutor.

All of this has sparked a wave of nationwide investigations. Finance Minister Ko Yun-chul said the government will work with the Financial Services Commission and the Financial Supervisory Service to verify the status of all digital assets held by public institutions. Officials are discussing putting in place immediate measures to prevent these incidents from happening again and to strengthen security in digital asset management, but no specific timelines or concrete measures have been announced so far.

The question now is: is this just a series of administrative mistakes, or are they signs of deeper problems in the government custody system? The numbers speak for themselves—4 million PRTG, 22 bitcoins, and multiple losses in different locations. Public trust in the state’s management of digital assets has become a serious concern.