USA: Another coordinated action against North Korea's remote employees
To circumvent US sanctions, North Korea has thousands of IT experts working remotely for Western companies. The USA has once again taken measures against this.
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In a coordinated action, US law enforcement authorities have taken action against North Korea's program to raise money through home office jobs. According to the US Department of Justice, 29 actual or potential “laptop farms” have been raided in 16 US states, and dozens of accounts and 21 fraudulent websites linked to the scheme have been taken over. The scams once again involved people from North Korea who worked remotely for US companies. In doing so, they not only generated salary payments for the North Korean regime, but also stole company secrets and even cryptocurrency.
Risk in Germany too
According to the US Department of Justice, North Korea had the help of several individuals from the USA, China, the United Arab Emirates and Taiwan. They helped the remote employees to obtain employment with over 100 US companies. For example, they had set up “laptop farms” at various locations in the USA, through which the North Koreans were able to carry out their activities without being traced back to North Korea. They also set up dummy companies, including websites, to simulate the activities of the alleged employees at previous employers.
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According to the report, the sophisticated approach was not just about enabling the North Koreans to receive salary payments from the USA, which the regime could use to circumvent the strict US sanctions. In one case, the North Koreans had remotely obtained sensitive employee data and source code from a service provider for the US military, which fell under the export control rules for weapons. In another case, North Koreans stole cryptocurrency worth 900,000 US dollars from their employers. One person was arrested in the US in connection with the allegations, but most of the defendants are beyond the reach of US prosecution.
The fact that North Korea sends IT workers with disguised origins to Western companies is nothing new. The US government warned companies of the risks as early as 2022. At the time, it was said that the isolated regime was sending thousands of highly qualified IT workers all over the world to finance the weapons development program sanctioned by the United Nations. A year later, it became clear that the sums involved were in the millions. In October, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution also warned German companies of the associated dangers. This also includes the risk of unknowingly violating sanctions.
(mho)
