> Jin-su spent most of his time trying to secure fraudulent identities which he could use to apply for jobs. He would first pose as Chinese, and contact people in Hungary, Turkey and other countries to ask them to use their identity in exchange for a percentage of his earnings, he told the BBC.
"If you put an 'Asian face' on that profile, you'll never get a job."
He would then use those borrowed identities to approach people in Western Europe for their identities, which he'd use to apply for jobs in the US and Europe. Jin-su often found success targeting UK citizens.
"With a little bit of chat, people in the UK passed on their identities so easily," he said.
Interesting. I was under the impression that most large employers perform basic background checks on new employees?
yapyap · 2h ago
Odd that he was sent abroad to do it, I always assumed they just did it from NK instead of abroad.
Also only having to give 85% to the regime seems pretty weird to me, it’d seem more logical to give 100% to the regime and have them provide the workers with a very cheap bed and food
dizhn · 1h ago
Maybe it's not so bad in North Korea? :)
deadbabe · 2m ago
It’s bad but not as bad as we’re made to believe, people still have lives worth living. They live, they laugh, they love. They do fun normal stuff, they have free thoughts, they have family.
yapyap · 1h ago
lol.
dlachausse · 2h ago
They probably hoped that the remaining 15% was just enough to keep the workers from defecting. That combined with the threat to brutally torture and kill their family that remained in North Korea were probably pretty effective motivators to stay loyal to the regime.
horns4lyfe · 1h ago
Tech employers would of course rather pay the North Korean regime than hire Americans at competitive wages
crop_rotation · 1h ago
I doubt these North Koreans are getting hired due to wage disparities (these are roles supposed to be in the US where they have a contact person in the US), more like they have perfected the interview process as the most important thing in their life.
phendrenad2 · 16m ago
I got the impression from the article he was working with people in Turkey and Hungary to use their identities to get jobs in the UK and US. So US company found this amazing Hungarian dev who would work for 1/5 what an American would ask for, but they paid for it either way their privacy (hey wait a minute, sounds familiar...)
"If you put an 'Asian face' on that profile, you'll never get a job." He would then use those borrowed identities to approach people in Western Europe for their identities, which he'd use to apply for jobs in the US and Europe. Jin-su often found success targeting UK citizens.
"With a little bit of chat, people in the UK passed on their identities so easily," he said.
Interesting. I was under the impression that most large employers perform basic background checks on new employees?
Also only having to give 85% to the regime seems pretty weird to me, it’d seem more logical to give 100% to the regime and have them provide the workers with a very cheap bed and food