How North Korea infiltrates its IT experts into Western companies
Iqlusion, like hundreds of other companies before it, unknowingly hired remote coders tasked with infiltrating businesses under a fake name and nationality, so they could earn salaries that were then almost entirely paid to the North Korean state.
While this phenomenon is not new – the United Nations Security Council first mentioned it in 2019 – until recently, it primarily affected American companies. But over recent months, experts have observed "an increase in operations in Europe," according to a report from Mandiant published in April. Developers have recently been hired for French projects, John Hultquist, chief analyst at this Google subsidiary, told Le Monde in late 2024.
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