Wang pleaded guilty to charges related to wire fraud, money laundering and identity theft and is awaiting sentencing next month.
“They could never pull this off if they didn’t have willing facilitators in the U.S. helping them.”.
North Korean teams typically rely on a maze of Chinese networks to launder it, according to industry reports.
In recent years, North Korea’s partnership with Chinese money laundering networks has unlocked a new level of speed and efficiency that North Korean operators had not been able to achieve independently.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un participates in a photo session with soldiers in North Pyongan province on Feb. 1.
“Unless you have external information, you might not know they’re North Korean,” said Michael Barnhart, who leads nation-state threat intelligence at DTEX.
That expansion also means concerns that North Korean workers could cause real-world harm by jeopardizing lives, something Barnhart has seen up close. »