North Korean fake remote worker scam lands two Americans 18-month prison sentences for hosting laptops — US firms unknowingly shipped laptops to “employees” who secretly worked from overseas via remote desktop, generating $1.2 million for Pyongyang

Source: Tom’s Hardware

Sentencing

The U.S. Department of Justice announced on Wednesday that two American citizens have been sentenced to a combined three years in prison for facilitating a fraudulent remote IT worker scheme aimed at generating revenue for North Korea. The department announced the sentencing in two separate cases: one involving Matthew Isaac Knoot from Nashville, Tennessee, and the other, Erick Ntekereze Prince of New York.

In both cases, the men received and hosted laptops at their residences that U.S. companies had shipped, believing they were being sent to legitimate U.S.-based IT workers they had hired. In the scheme, North Korean scammers posing as remote IT workers applied to numerous companies. Upon hiring, the companies sent out company‑issued gadgets, as is common in the IT industry. The scammers provided the addresses of their American collaborators, who received and set up the laptops.