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We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

cinder.co

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Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#111

Post by kaliqt »

brookst wrote: post #55
cogman10 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

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…

Name alone is not a red flag, almost every Asian maintains an English name.

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#112

Post by n4r9 »

Kiro wrote: post #82
gfaure wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adoption makes it entirely possible for an Asian-presenting person to have a European first name _and_ surname and, frankly, is not something you should be asked about in an interview.

Of course, in theory, there's a possibility that someone named Simon Cartwright, with a North Korean accent, who has amnesia and can't remember a thing about the place they claim they grew up in, is actually not a spy. I personally don't think that's a situation where an employer is required to give the benefit of the doubt.

How many employers can reliably distinguish a North Korean accent from a South Korean one?

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#113

Post by SSLy »

kaliqt wrote: post #111
brookst wrote: post #55

Earlier 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…

Name alone is not a red flag, almost every Asian maintains an English name.

Every Chinese, dunno about other countries.

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#114

Post by tga »

kaliqt wrote: post #111
brookst wrote: post #55

Earlier 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…

Name alone is not a red flag, almost every Asian maintains an English name.

We're talking about English/European _last_ names though. Definitely possible in today's international world, but much less common.

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#115

Post by shantara »

As a person with zero social media presence, I can't decide whether to be amused or horrified that it's always mentioned as a red flag by these 3 letter agency types. Add to that working remotely for more than 10 years and my love for working outdoors and from coffee shops which have some background noise level, and I'm feeling like a true North Korean according to this article.

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#116

Post by Jolter »

callalex wrote: post #87
trentnix wrote: post #2

I 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…

I’m mixed race in a visually non-obvious way. I was born and raised in the bay. What is the “correct” ethnicity that I should try to project with my name?

You have the name you have. You look the way you look. You speak the way you speak. But if you claim to have grown up in one country, or lived for X years with professional success in one city, yet can’t speak the language spoken there and can’t answer simple questions about what you did, where you lived etc? Surely you see why someone would be suspicious, especially as these circumstances add up?

I agree wholeheartedly that you can’t/shouldn’t be suspicious just because someone has an “English” name and looks East Asian, but that together with the other signs is just a bit much.

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#117

Post by Jolter »

asynchronous wrote: post #78
akira2501 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’d guess that there’s a chance that they specifically targeted this company There's even a chance this never actually happened as presented.

We don’t have any evidence except bogus applicants- this is just speculation at best. Sad it hit front of HN though.

“We” (the readers of HN) don’t have any evidence per se, just a blog post. But I also don’t see why anyone would make up this particular story.

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#118

Post by DarkmSparks »

edm0nd wrote: post #48
DarkmSparks wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure they have a few thousand such candidates out and about. But surely insignificant to the hundreds of millions in China, India, Indonesia etc. Why DPRK when the alternatives are so much more numerous? The entire population of DPRK is only 26mil, the entire country is half the size of the city Jakarta. Most Americans probably outright lie on their CV, that tells you nothing.

More like tens of thousands. The Lazarus Group alone is suspected to be comprised of ~3,500+ people. If I had to guess, likely because the NK workers are highly motivated to succeed under threats of duress and threats involving their families/own life. I dont think these employers are willingly hiring DPRK workers over other countries, likely more so that DPRK are more ruthless and aggressive with their application a…

again, e.g. China is far more equiped and active in this practice

https://m.youtube.com/shorts/A8L4QjIHL4k

using 100s of millions of people out of their several Billion population.

How to differentiate between them and the few thousand DPRK emigrants do the same?

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#119

Post by inemesitaffia »

carlmr wrote: post #107
slavboj wrote: post #29

Most 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?

Lawsuit is still live.

Re: We found North Korean engineers in our application pile

#120

Post by xandrius »

knowitnone wrote: post #40

what prevents a middle man that can speak the language who gets hired and ships the work to NK or allows a NK agent to remotely work through computer? also, it's not just the money going to NK, what about the IP being stolen?

Nothing at all, that's why you can absolutely believe someone somewhere is already doing this.
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