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North Korean IT workers are stealing remote jobs and raking in billions—and Americans are helping them do it
Amanda Gerut / Sat, April 25, 2026 at 6:02 AM GMT-5The North Korean IT worker scheme, in which operatives get remote tech jobs at U.S. and European companies, is an important part of a broad campaign of malfeasance by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) that has generated about $2.8 billion in the past two years to help fund the country’s nuclear weapon ambitions, according to the UN’s Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Committee. The committee, which tracks DPRK sanctions violations and evasion tactics, revealed in January that the scheme has now victimized 40 countries around the globe. A large portion of that total is the result of crypto theft, but the IT worker scheme reliably generates $250 million to $600 million per year in fraudulent salaries, the UN has found.
North Korean IT workers are stealing remote jobs and raking in billions—and Americans are helping them do it
“North Korean IT worker schemes would not be successful without U.S.-based facilitators,” wrote Assistant Attorney General John Eisenberg in an April sentencing memo.