US 'laptop farm' man accused of outsourcing his IT jobs to North Korea to fund weapons programs

The FBI today arrested a Tennessee man suspected of running a "laptop farm" that got North Koreans, posing as Westerners, IT jobs at American and British companies. It's claimed this swindle helped generate cash toward Pyongyang's weapons programs. According to US prosecutors, Matthew Isaac Knoot, 38, of Nashville, defrauded …

[Michael Hoffmann]

Once again: how much did HE make out of it? Most of the money went to the Norks, it seems.

If the answer is "a couple hundred thousand" versus the risk of 20 years in federal prison (no parole in federal, only some days reduction for good behaviour!), then he is an absolute and utter moron! Or should have read up on "risk management".

And for helping NK with weapons, I dare-say the sentencing guidelines will slew much more towards those 20 years than 2. If they find something constituting espionage, he's leaving jail on the far side of retirement age, if ever.

[veti]

I want to know that, too. If I were in his position, I'd have stuck to about 80% of the income for myself. Otherwise what's the point?

No doubt the prosecutors want to paint him as unsympathetically as possible, so they're egging on this "paying for Nork weapons" schtick, but common sense suggests he probably lived pretty well for a while.

[The Central Scrutinizer]

They should have twigged earlier, when he said his username was Kim Log In.

[martinusher]

To Fund Weapons Programs

Its this sort of nonsense statement that brings the entire western Establishment into disrepute.

The FBI has no way of knowing if one individual earning what is a bit of pin money in North Korea is buying weapons with it so why they feed us this nonsense (and why our media laps it up) is just plain insulting. If anything its encouraging a bit of Free Enterprise in the DPRK...

[diodesign]

Re: To Fund Weapons Programs

Well, Kim ain't spending it on his people. But yeah, interesting focus by Uncle Sam. Reminds me of Colin Powell's speech.

C.

[doublelayer]

Re: To Fund Weapons Programs

It's not private enterprise. In order to get a network connection to start doing this work, you need approval from the government to have one, often not even in North Korea. The scale of the operation and repeated statements, including from workers, managers, and government leaders have demonstrated that this operation is government-controlled. So yes, the money earned from doing it goes into government coffers. They spend it on whatever they want, including agricultural supplies, fancy stuff for the Kims, and weapons manufacture and research programs. Not in that order.

[Casca]

Re: To Fund Weapons Programs

LMAO, I hope you are joking.

[Anonymous Coward]

$250k??

For EACH job for one year? I am skeptical.

[bud-weis-er]

We're not worthy

We can all learn from this fella... frigging genius

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: We're not worthy

Not really. If, as TFA suggests, all the incomes were being routed through one identity it would raise a flag sooner or later.

[Potemkine!]

They will sell us the rope with which we will hang them

Subcontracting to the lowest bidder, isn't that pure capitalism?

Talking about outsourcing to nice countries, this one is beautiful too:

Britain’s nuclear submarine engineers use software that was designed in Russia and Belarus, in contravention of Ministry of Defence rules, The Telegraph can reveal. The software should have been created by UK-based staff with security clearance, but its design was partially outsourced to developers in Siberia and Minsk, the capital of Belarus.

[...] The inquiry discovered that the firm that outsourced the work – on a staff intranet for nuclear submarine engineers – to Russia and Belarus initially kept it secret and discussed whether it could disguise where the workers were based by giving them fake names of dead British people.

[...] It was alleged WM Reply wanted to use developers based out of an office in the Belarusian capital of Minsk to cut costs, according to documents submitted to the MoD’s inquiry. Developers in Belarus would have cost “substantially less” than those in the UK, so contracting them for the project – worth around half a million pounds in total – would “increase the profit margin”, it was claimed.

For those interested in PR BS, WM Reply statement is a beautiful example:

“WM Reply regularly reviews its delivery processes and procedures, respects the needs and processes of its customers and enjoys transparent and long-standing relationships with those customers”.

Indeed.

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: They will sell us the rope with which we will hang them

The software being "designed in Russia and Belarus" bit in the quoted article links to another Telegraph article which goes on at length about submarines but makes no reference to software at all, let alone where it was "designed".

[martinusher]

Re: They will sell us the rope with which we will hang them

Outsourcing goes to wherever the labor's cheapest. "Niceness" doesn't come into it. The downside is that while costs are cut and profits made in the short term eventually you don't just export the work, you also export the expertise. Its now quite likely that there's nobody left in the UK would could design a complete submarine.

Also, the fact that the 'software' is foreign doesn't mean a thing but it does demonstrate a certain degree of ignorance by 'management' which probably explains the need to outsource the work in the first place. (....and, if anything, the Russians should be concerned about the leakage of their expertise)

[Wyrdness]

What are these jobs?

So what are these remote IT jobs that pay a quarter of a million a year and don't involve having to go in to the office or, it seems, even speak to your manager or colleagues?

And how do I get one?

[veti]

Re: What are these jobs?

1: Make friends with a highly skilled person in a sanctioned country. North Korea is probably a bit toxic at the moment, consider Iran or, better, Cuba.

2: Get them to apply for the job using your name.

3: Set up a VPN to allow them to work "from" your house.

4: Divvy up the loot. I suggest keeping at least 80% for yourself, after all you're the one running the risk here.

[Zibob]

Due diligence?

So yes this guy is in the wrong, but what if the companies that didn't do their background work on who they were hiring.

Not that they are just as culpable, but if their work needed any level of secrecy or privacy they should look into who they are hiring to do that job.

[cantankerous swineherd]

entrepreneur uses sub contractors shock horror

[trevorde]

Seen this one before

Worked at a company where one dev opened up his system to remote workers while he goofed off. He was rumbled quite quickly because the code was cr4p.

[shadattack]

I would like to know how much money he got out of this... for potentially spending the rest of his life in prison