"As the virtual asset market matures, the importance of reliable custody and operational infrastructure will grow. AhnLab Blockchain Company (ABC) aims to become Korea's leading virtual asset infrastructure provider so financial institutions and public institutions can use virtual assets with confidence."
Lim Ju-young, head of ABC, the Blockchain subsidiary of domestic security company AhnLab, said the firm will establish itself as a virtual asset infrastructure provider in the next-generation digital finance market. ABC last month completed approval of its Virtual Asset Service Provider (VASP) registration for virtual asset "custody and transfer," which entails receiving customers' virtual assets in custody for safekeeping and management and carrying out asset transfers after internal approval procedures upon customer request.
With this VASP license, ABC has secured a legal basis to conduct custody and transmission-related business for virtual assets within the formal system. Based on this, it plans to expand its Web3 financial infrastructure business for corporate customers. In particular, it is pushing to build enterprise virtual asset infrastructure for the financial sector in cooperation with its second-largest shareholder, SK Telecom. The companies are also jointly reviewing the potential use of a won-based stablecoin.
ABC operates the Blockchain virtual asset wallet and custody services "ABC Wallet" and "Klip." They help individual users safely store and manage virtual assets. Recently, it launched the ABC Cloud Wallet service, which allows users from corporations, institutions, and foundations to apply online and safely store virtual assets.
After majoring in clinical pathology at Inje University and completing a doctoral course in virtual convergence business at Sogang University, Lim joined AhnLab in 2007 and was in charge of planning security products in the Open Innovation division. At ABC, Lim led development of the ABC Wallet and Klip services and pursued VASP-based custody business. The following is a Q&A with Lim.
─What is the significance of obtaining the VASP license.
"The acquisition of the VASP license is meaningful in that ABC has secured a legal foundation to carry out the business of custody, management, and transfer of virtual assets. Based on this, we plan to provide custody services for corporate customers. When customers deposit their virtual assets with ABC, ABC holds control over the cryptographic keys, safeguards and manages the assets, and performs asset transfers after going through authentication, risk assessment, and internal approval procedures at the customer's request.
Customer assets are managed separately from the company's own assets. They are held segregated on a like-kind, like-quantity basis without external deployment. In particular, we support financial institutions, fintechs, and platform operators so they can introduce functions for virtual asset custody, management, and transfer without directly building complex custody infrastructure. We aim to lower the entry barriers for corporations to Web3-based business, and once institutional conditions are in place, we are also reviewing the possibility of participating in custody for public-sector assets such as seized virtual assets."
─What is ABC's custody advantage.
"ABC's custody advantage lies in combining security-based technical capabilities with regulatory response capabilities. We implement core custody functions in-house, including private key management, transaction signing, and real-time anomaly detection.
We also support anti-money laundering (AML) and fraud detection system (FDS) responses through on-chain analysis and Know Your Transaction (KYT) technology. This reduces reliance on external solutions and enables quick and flexible responses to changing regulatory environments. Our strength is providing infrastructure that goes beyond simple safekeeping to address both security and regulatory needs."
─What differentiates the newly launched custody service.
"Existing ABC Wallet or Klip are non-custodial wallet services that value individual autonomy, with users directly retaining control over their cryptographic keys. They are the only domestic KYC personal wallets that protect users from external hacking, key loss, risky transactions, and connections with decentralized finance (DeFi).
The newly launched ABC Cloud Wallet uses a custodial structure in which the parent company AhnLab holds customers' keys under internal security controls and is involved in executing asset transfer procedures at the customer's request. AML capabilities have been strengthened by combining AhnLab's security intelligence with domestic and international Blockchain intelligence. In particular, on-chain AML enables comprehensive monitoring and management of money laundering and suspicious transactions end to end."
─What is the status of cooperation with the financial sector.
"This year, we conducted proofs of concept (PoC) for a won stablecoin with various financial institutions, including banks, credit card companies, brokerages, and payment gateway (PG) firms. ABC seeks to help financial institutions quickly introduce internal staff wallets, corporate asset management wallets, institutional investor custody, and stablecoin payment and settlement environments without having to build complex Blockchain infrastructure themselves. If a won stablecoin is institutionalized, our goal is to position ABC as a core infrastructure provider that helps financial institutions operate virtual asset services stably.
Expansion into the public sector is also an important goal. Recently, demand has been growing in the public sector to safely store and manage virtual assets for criminal proceeds recovery and the management of seized and forfeited assets. Based on our VASP license and institutional-grade custody infrastructure, ABC aims to contribute to building secure storage and management systems for seized and forfeited virtual assets administered by courts, investigative agencies, and public institutions."
─What is the future business direction.
"ABC plans to expand its AI-based Web3 financial infrastructure business in line with the shift from traditional financial systems to on-chain virtual asset finance. Starting with the newly launched ABC Cloud Wallet custody service, we will provide an enterprise wallet service (WaaS, Wallet-as-a-Service) that enables corporations and institutions to build Blockchain wallet services safely and easily, along with an agentic AI-based wallet operations system to manage them.
We aim to provide an AI operations infrastructure that supports not only custodial and non-custodial wallet buildout, but also operations, management, auditing, and regulatory compliance. In the early stage when legal regulations and procedures for on-chain financial transactions are being established, our goal is to enable AI to assist in real time with various issues that require communication with regulators. We will also strengthen our "BICScan" project, an intelligent Blockchain threat detection platform that proactively detects and blocks threats to on-chain transactions. We plan to expand B2B infrastructure businesses such as custody, WaaS, and BICScan."