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North Korea allegedly made millions from US companies through remote work scheme (www.bbc.com)

submitted 4 days ago by tardigrada@beehaw.org to c/usnews@beehaw.org

29 comments fedilink hide all child comments

A federal court in St Louis has indicted 14 North Koreans for allegedly being part of a long-running conspiracy aimed at extorting funds from US companies and funneling money to Pyongyang's weapons programmes.

The wider scheme allegedly involves thousands of North Korean IT workers who use false, stolen, and borrowed identities from people in the US and other countries to get hired and work remotely for US firms.

The indictement says the defendants and others working with them generated at least $88m (£51.5m) for the North Korean regime over a six-year period.

[...]

The prosecutors say the suspects worked for two North Korean-controlled companies - China-based Yanbian Silverstar and Russia-based Volasys Silverstar.

[...]

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[–] tardigrada@beehaw.org 4 points 4 days ago (3 children)

These people didn't work to 'feed their families'. Their families likely didn't benefit at all from this scheme.

[–] rtc@beehaw.org 2 points 2 days ago

The presence of remote working itself exposes the flaws with the arguer's chain of comments. It is (and it is funny that I can actually make this conclusion) impossible that the money does not go directly to the North Korea regime. North Korean civilians have no internet.

[–] LukeZaz@beehaw.org 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

How do you know?

[–] rtc@beehaw.org 4 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

Aside from using stolen identities to avoid detection, prosecutors said they paid people residing in the US to receive, set up, and host laptops provided by the US employers. They would then instruct those US residents to install remote access software allowing them to appear to be working from the US when they were actually overseas.

It is directly in the article. It is impossible for civilians to do this. In an absolute sense.

Lastly, the aggressive countering nature of this comment was unnecessary if you were merely seeking clarification.

[–] LukeZaz@beehaw.org 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It is impossible for civilians to do this. In an absolute sense.

I know of nothing whatsoever that proves this. The article certainly doesn't clarify anything to that effect.

Lastly, the aggressive countering nature of this comment was unnecessary if you were merely seeking clarification.

It was four words, without any emphasis. I deliberately wrote my comment to be simple and calm. Any aggression you've interpreted is on you, not me, and I suspect you only read it that way due a to a pre-existing negative opinion of me.

[–] rtc@beehaw.org 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I know of nothing whatsoever that proves this.

Yet you dispute things which reference it without trying to learn more about it yourself. Instead you ask others and dispute them like it is owed to you.

It is not anyone's problem in particular that someone doesn't know something. You could've ignored the post and comments, or you could've genuinely sought to know more if you cared. While putting in your own effort to supplement it.

simple and calm

Perhaps I could plaster everything you say with 'how do you know'. Not that I'm going to do it because I know how malicious doing so would be. The lack of elaboration in dispute is anything but 'simple and calm' because your question puts the obligation on the person saying anything to absolutely answer to you without the assurance that you actually care about the topic and want to know more, and not that you do not care about the topic regardless. Elaborate more. That would be simple and calm, if the elaboration were put in a simple and calm manner.

[–] MachineFab812@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Repeating the same tired gibberish with no elabbration, much?

[–] tardigrada@beehaw.org 3 points 3 days ago (1 children)

These aren't 'common' IT workers seeking a job but spies working for North Korea as the article says. What should I elaborate here?