Identities of more than 80 Americans stolen for North Korean IT workers fraud
For years, the North Korean government has discovered a burgeoning source of sanctions by entrusting its citizens Secretly apply for a remote high-tech job in the West. The newly revealed takedown operations by American law enforcement reveal how many of the infrastructure used to make those schemes US-based, the number of American identities stolen by North Korean impersonation to carry them out.
Monday, the Ministry of Justice announcement A drastic operation to crack down on US-based elements of North Korea’s remote IT workers scheme, including indictments against two Americans who the government says are involved in the operation. The authorities also searched 29 “laptop farms” in 16 states that were used to receive and host remote access for North Korean workers on PCs, and acquired around 200 of those computers, 21 web domains and 29 financial accounts, which earned around 200 of those computers and 21 financial domains and 29 financial accounts. The DOJ announcement and indictment also reportedly, authorities say North Korea did not create fake IDs to hint at Western technology companies, but was also sent to the Kim administration, stealing the identities of “more than 80 Americans above the US” and impersonating them as jobs in more than 100 American companies.
“It’s huge,” says Michael Bernhardt, an investigator focused on North Korean hacking and spying at DTEX, a security company that focuses on insider threats. “Whenever you have a laptop farm like this, it’s the soft abdomen of these operations. They close them in so many states.
In total, the DOJ believes that six Americans have been identified who believe they are involved in a scheme that allows for the impersonation of North Korean tech workers, but only two have been appointed and criminally charged. Prosecutors accused the two men of helping them steal North Korea’s score identities, and North Korea receives laptops sent from its employers and sets up remote access for North Korea to control those machines from around the world. I made money. The DOJ also says two American men worked with six names of Chinese coconspirators, according to the charging documents and two Taiwanese nationals.
To create a cover identity for North Korean workers, prosecutors say the two kings have accessed the personal details of more than 700 Americans in search of private records. However, it is said that North Koreans are impersonating them for the sake of individuals. They are said to have gone further to enable North Korea to apply for jobs under their names using scans of identity theft victims’ driver’s licenses and social security cards.
How these personal documents are said to have been acquired is not clear from the claims. However, according to Barnhart of DTEX, North Korea’s impersonation operations typically obtain American identification documents from the Dark Web Cybercriminal forum or from the data leak site. In fact, he says that the 80+ stolen identities cited by the DOJ represent a small sample of thousands of US IDs cited from the infrastructure of the North Korean hacking operation.