The National Police Agency and other organizations have announced that there are suspicions that a North Korean IT engineer is pretending to be a Japanese person and obtaining income by taking on work from Japanese companies. We are calling for stronger measures.
A United Nations report points out that North Korea dispatches IT engineers to foreign countries, and the income they receive from these jobs under false pretenses is used to fund nuclear and missile development.
Under these circumstances, the National Police Agency, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Finance, and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry are suspected of impersonating Japanese people to earn income by contracting work from companies and engaging in malicious cyber activities. The ministries jointly issued a document calling for caution and announced specific methods.
According to the report, many IT engineers in North Korea, while residing in China, Russia, Southeast Asia, etc., fake their identity and nationality as freelance engineers and register accounts on the platform's job site, creating web pages and software. We are currently recruiting for a wide range of work, including production.
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The name on the account does not match the name on the account that receives the fee,
▽Speaks unnatural Japanese,
▽Does not respond to video conference-style meetings,
▽Recruits for work with lower fees than the general market rate. It is said that it has the following characteristics.
According to the National Police Agency, three cases have been detected so far in Japan, including fraudulent remittances to North Korean IT engineers.
The National Police Agency and other agencies are calling on companies and organizations to strengthen countermeasures, such as thorough identity verification, as ordering work and paying for it may violate domestic law.