> We also noticed vague cover letter language: Sadly, the examples in the article are as good as, or better, than letters I've received from US-based devs.
I'm just surprised to learn someone is actually reading cover letters in this industry.
We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
101–110 of 141 posts
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
Certainly someone of obvious Asian descent and accent who introduces themselves as “Simon” is not a red flag. As you say, some people understandably prefer not to hear their real name mangled every day. But someone of obvious Asian descent and accent who introduces themselves as “Simon Cartwright” and has vague tales of growing up in London… again, it’s possible, and we should treat each individual with respect and a…
There is simply more noise than signal with this style of racial profiling and I implore you to do some soul-searching and reconsidering because you are probably harming people without even intending to with your current behavior.
IANAL, but I think it's flat-out illegal in the US, not just harmful. (And if it's not illegal, it should be.)
From https://www.eeoc.gov/prohibited-employment-policiespractices:
> An employer may not base hiring decisions on stereotypes and assumptions about a person's race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy), national origin, age (40 or older), disability or genetic information.
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#103Anyone else noticing the volume on North Korean reporting and headlines creeping up lately? I do not, in the current political climate, consider any of this a good sign.
Yup. It’s first Iran, then North Korea. The consent-manufacturing apparatus is working as intended.
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#104[dead]
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#105> A mismatch between the name displayed on the resume or networking site, and the candidate’s command of English (e.g. Chris Smith with a B.A. from a large US research university who can barely speak interview-level English is surprising). IANAL, but this sounds 100% illegal to me. From https://www.eeoc.gov/prohibited-employment-policiespractices : > An employer may not base hiring decisions on stereotypes and assump…
But they aren't making hiring decisions based on stereotypes; they are making hiring decisions based on someone not being who they claim to be. Right?
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#106> A mismatch between the name displayed on the resume or networking site, and the candidate’s command of English (e.g. Chris Smith with a B.A. from a large US research university who can barely speak interview-level English is surprising). IANAL, but this sounds 100% illegal to me. From https://www.eeoc.gov/prohibited-employment-policiespractices : > An employer may not base hiring decisions on stereotypes and assump…
IANAL, but racial discrimination based on a name is certainly illegal. However, rejecting a candidate who can't speak English well despite attending a university in the US isn't illegal.
If the based their decisions on the 2nd half of that, it could be fine.
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#107Most of the indica of "North Korean workers" are also correlates of protected hiring characteristics ("names that didn’t match their ethnicity"). If the United States federal government has a reason to dislike your company, they will use your efforts to suggest illegal hiring discrimination, as they did when they attacked SpaceX for not recruiting "refugees" to work on export-controlled dual use rocket tech.
>when they attacked SpaceX for not recruiting "refugees" to work on export-controlled dual use rocket tech.
Sauce?
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#108I can confirm coming across the exact same kind of profile, but in Europe. Most we found on LinkedIn keyword searches, some applied directly. I've taken a couple of interviews to confirm and indeed it was a scam, they didn't know anything about the country, the companies, or the schools in their resume. Also they were all East Asian, with implausible names and origin stories.
Many times the signs are rather obvious, the keywords are right but everything about the profile is just off and doesn't stand to even a bit of scrutiny. I suspect it's done on purpose, just like Nigerian scams, to optimize for gullible or inattentive companies.
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#109It's not much related BUT beware a thing: in FLOSS we are open, to anyone, so a CIA engineer and a NK ones could possibly work on the same codebase and that's PERFECTLY FINE. Because code must be reviewed, and recent XZ Utils lesson prove just that, not something else. If you try to create wall in FLOSS it will not end up well, the point IS being mixed using the same stack so anyone will anyway try to made good code for anyone else. Are exactly walls those who create threats.
Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile
#110I had similar experiences at my last employer when hiring last fall. In both cases, the fraud was easily made plain when I asked details about their work history. In one case, they claimed to live in the same metro area I had previously lived for 18 years, but couldn’t answer any basic questions about the place. In another situation, they claimed a workplace that was in a community I was familiar with and that was fa…
> names that didn’t match their ethnicity The people I've known from China and Korea have a tendency to adopt traditional English names (Steve, Joe, Mike, etc) because their native names are hard to pronounce for English speakers. Further, the 2nd generation Asian Americans I've met do often have traditional English names.
What I'm still trying to figure out is how exactly the next step is supposed to work.
One of the first things we ask from both employees and freelancers is a copy of their passport/ID. Would they also have a fake ID with the name they give you (much easier to fake a PDF than a real passport) or just a story, passing you through a legit company? Or is it common to hire people without really knowing who they are?