Nail salon employee pleads guilty after holding 13 remote IT jobs worked by developers in China

• Minh Phuong Ngoc Vong, 40, from Bowie, Maryland will be sentenced in August in August After pleading guilty of conspiracy in order to commit fraud in wines this month. Vong's guilt advocacy is the last intrigue in what the authorities say they are a vast fake workers' program This finances the program of nuclear missiles and illegal ballistic missiles from North Korea. The authorities said that Vong essentially rented its American identity to China -based developers who used it to obtain more than a dozen remote technological jobs, some of which involved contractual work for sensitive government agencies.

A 40 -year -old Maryland man is facing Decades in prison after having pretended to work with foreign nationals in China to obtain distance computer employment with at least 13 different American companies between 2021 and 2024. The jobs paid him more than $ 970,000 wages for software development tasks that were really carried out by the authorities of the agents, according to the Ministry of Justice.

Developers based in China used the company's computer jobs, some of which involved contracting software services to American government agencies such as the Federal Aviation AdministrationTo have access to government systems very sensitive to which they connected abroad, the authorities said. According to the Ministry of Justice, the plan of the man of Maryland is part of a Great fraud operation in which trained North Korean Nationals work American facilitators To fraudulently obtain computer jobs at a distance under various identities, do work in Russia or China, then illegally put their wages back to Kim Jong Un, authoritarian chief of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (RPDC).

There have been dozens of accusation acts in the conspiracy, including the Americans who pleaded guilty to the reception of computer farms, where they keep dozens of laptops issued by the middle home business estimated The program generates revenues between $ 250 and $ 600 million each year and finances the illegal nuclear nuclear weapons program. The FBI, the State Department and the Ministry of Justice say thousands IT workers from the RPDC have been hired for hundreds of fortune companies 500 in recent years.

In the case involving Maryland, Minh Phuong Ngoc Vong, the DoJ claims to have worked in the league with developers in China, including the one called “William James”. Judicial files show that the authorities believed that James and others John in the program are from North Korea. Vong would have said to an FBI agent “William” approached him via a mobile phone video application and told Vong that he could “legally” earn money by obtaining development jobs and giving William his access to the computer access.

According to the doj and the court documents, Vong has left James and the other nameless conspirators to write a fraudulent curriculum to tell him that he had a diploma from the University of Hawaii, 16 years of experience as a software developer, and had already maintained a secret security authorization. The Doj said that Vong, who worked in a nail and spa lounge, had neither a diploma nor had experience in development.

At one of the 13 jobs, someone who identified himself as Vong would have joined an online interview with a senior software developer who recommended him to obtain the position and took a screenshot of him during the meeting. The CEO of the company based in Virginia hired him later after a Successful final interview In which Vong would have shown his driver's license from Maryland and his American passport to confirm his identity, and the company captured Vong a second time by holding the documents. (Judicial files show that the authorities think that these screenshots are of two different people – one who would be a North Korean IT worker posing as Vong, and another who is the real Vong of Maryland holding his license and his passport.)

The company has placed Vong to work on a FAA contract which involved a request for monitoring assets from aviation in flight in the United States, according to the judicial archives. The software is used by government agencies such as the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Internal Security and the Secret Services. The Virginia Company has sent a MacBook Pro laptop with administrative rights to download software and the FAA Let Vong has a Checking personal identity card to bring it into government facilities and systems, Judicial files show. Vong would have installed remote access software on the company's device so that James and its cohort can use it from China.

Between March and July 2023, the Virginia Company paid more than $ 28,000 in Vong while the work was carried out by James and other strangers, the DoJ said. During his stay there, someone known as vong attended zoom meetings to work and spoke to his team about his list of tasks during a daily meeting. As part of his guilt advocacy, Vong admitted that Virginia's work was only one between 13 different companies that hired him between 2021 and 2024. Several contracted work for the American government, in addition to the FAA. Vong was dismissed by the Virginia Company after submitting its information to the Defense Counterationing and Security Agency for secret authorization and discovered that it could have another job.

After being dismissed, the CEO showed Vong's photo to the main developer who initially recommended it. The developer told CEO that the individual he had called “vong” in the photo was not the same “vong” that he had initially interviewed and captured screen. Nor was he the person who participated in daily virtual meetings and worked.

Vong pleaded guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud in wire and risk 20 years in prison. Reached by phone, Vong refused to comment.

Michael “Barni” Barnhart, principal investigator at the risk of initiate at DTEX Systems, said Fortune In a press release, the continuous efforts of the American police to expose and disrupt the operations of North Korean IT workers and the facilitators that allow them is positive progress.

“These acts of accusation are another essential step in the annoyance of contradictory operations,” said Barnhart in the press release. However, Barnhart said that his group had directly observed that workers trying to obtain other very sensitive jobs, including positions with the American government and third -party entrepreneurs for federal agencies.

In addition, in a report published this month, the Google threat intelligence group revealed The program is expanding and an RPDC worker at the end of last year operated at least 12 characters in Europe and the United States, and was looking for more jobs in European defense and with government entrepreneurs. Other surveys have found false identities of IT workers looking for jobs in Germany and Portugal, according to the latest report.

“Even if these actors are mainly motivated by finance, the risk they represent for critical infrastructure is enormous,” said John Hultquist, chief analyst of Google's Keners Intelligence Group Fortune. “This scheme has become so widespread that the targeting of these organizations is almost inevitable. Given their link with the intelligence services, this type of access could be a nightmare. ”

The FBI Baltimore office investigation in the case.

This story was initially presented on Fortune.com