Nearly $5 million worth of cryptocurrency has been lost after South Korea’s National Tax Service accidentally shared an image of the passwords for seized crypto wallets.

The tax authority had taken enforcement action against 124 tax evaders, sharing the confiscated assets in a public press release.

Within the release were high-resolution pictures of the seized hardware wallets, which reportedly contained around 8.1 billion won ($5.5m, £41.m).

The images also contained handwritten notes that revealed the wallets’ recovery mnemonics.

A recovery mnemonic, or seed phrase, is a list of 12, 18, or 24 random words that act as the master key for a crypto wallet.

They are designed to allow users to recover their assets in the event of a phone,…