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North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

bbc.com

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Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#41

Post by dttze »

dh2022 wrote: post #39
deadbabe wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s bad but not as bad as we’re made to believe, people still have lives worth living. They live, they laugh, they love. They do fun normal stuff, they have free thoughts, they have family.

Oh my God, you are so naive. Normal stuff in NK is watching your kids wasting away because of lack of calories (average North Korean is 10 inches shorter than average South Korean-even though 70nyears ago they were the same people genetically). Is living with a radio in your home that does not stop singing praise to the regime - neighbors will report you if they think you turned off the radio. If they have free thoug…

You have no idea what happens in NK and are trying to pretend you do because you read some western propaganda. Get a clue.

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#42

Post by braingravy »

dttze wrote: post #41
dh2022 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh my God, you are so naive. Normal stuff in NK is watching your kids wasting away because of lack of calories (average North Korean is 10 inches shorter than average South Korean-even though 70nyears ago they were the same people genetically). Is living with a radio in your home that does not stop singing praise to the regime - neighbors will report you if they think you turned off the radio. If they have free thoug…

You have no idea what happens in NK and are trying to pretend you do because you read some western propaganda. Get a clue.

Found the NK IT worker :)

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#43

Post by sugarpimpdorsey »

kibwen wrote: post #22
forinti wrote: post #21

But are they any good? I suppose they must be, as they seem to retain their jobs, but how do they rank overall? Also, I tend to think that maintaining these interactions going might be a way to let more information into Naughty Korea and might actually have a positive influence in the long run.

The risk is not the quality of the work that the person might do. The risk is that you now have a state-controlled North Korean asset operating inside your security perimeter.

It's 2025, it's all about zero-trust now. Can't be inside the security perimeter when there is no security perimeter.

Hiring mischievous North Koreans is fully in line with your CIO's new priorities, which she heard about at a conference once.

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#44

Post by deadbabe »

dh2022 wrote: post #39
deadbabe wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s bad but not as bad as we’re made to believe, people still have lives worth living. They live, they laugh, they love. They do fun normal stuff, they have free thoughts, they have family.

Oh my God, you are so naive. Normal stuff in NK is watching your kids wasting away because of lack of calories (average North Korean is 10 inches shorter than average South Korean-even though 70nyears ago they were the same people genetically). Is living with a radio in your home that does not stop singing praise to the regime - neighbors will report you if they think you turned off the radio. If they have free thoug…

You're just feeding into western propaganda. Yes North Korean people are poor and there's tons of inequality but they are still real people. They are not in a constant war being bombed and tortured endlessly. They tend to farms, chat with friends, make jokes, feel pain and joy, they do what they can. I know that sounds like literal hell to a tech obsessed population that has to filter everything through the lens of social media, but for many people this is just life.

A lot of North Koreans probably don't even think about the government, it just has always existed and always will exist to them, they don't think about things being anther way because it won't be, so they just get on with it. It's like the people who believe propaganda that America has turned into a hell hole now under Trump where people have no rights or opportunity and have to live in fear of mass shootings or being kidnapped by ICE everyday. For the vast majority of American's that just not accurate at all. Touch grass.

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#45

Post by D-Coder »

tough wrote: post #17
apwell23 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. They don't need to worry about defections. Unless the guy really wants condemn his whole extended family and next 7 generations into labor camps.

Its quite presumptuous to assume that 1. Every citizen will have ties or family to -think of- 2. The current regime (which is now on its third generation) will last 7 generations more. 3. You have any descendants at all

It's a threat. It doesn't have to be perfect. If the citizen does have a family or descendants, it will have a significant effective rate.

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#47

Post by dang »

maximilianburke wrote: post #30
nsksl wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

This is quite possibly the most anti-semitic comment I've ever seen here.

A handful of commenters do post like this, but we ban them when we see them. It's mostly the same few serial trolls with a long trail of banned accounts behind them.

If you see any more of these, you can help by flagging them and/or emailing us at hn@ycombinator.com.

(To flag a comment, click on its timestamp to go to its page, then click the 'flag' link at the top. There's a small karma threshold before flag links appear.)

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#48

Post by dang »

DoctorOW wrote: post #9
vuffert wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

What's the difference between Jewish and American?

"Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead."

a.k.a. please don't feed the trolls

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#49

Post by mhurron »

kibwen wrote: post #22
forinti wrote: post #21

But are they any good? I suppose they must be, as they seem to retain their jobs, but how do they rank overall? Also, I tend to think that maintaining these interactions going might be a way to let more information into Naughty Korea and might actually have a positive influence in the long run.

The risk is not the quality of the work that the person might do. The risk is that you now have a state-controlled North Korean asset operating inside your security perimeter.

A lot of these are not there to breach your data, they're there to make money and fund the DRPK.

That's why there's no one industry or types of businesses being targeted, it's anywhere they can get hired. If your a high profile target, that's a bonus not the original goal.

Re: North Korea sent him abroad to be a secret IT worker

#50

Post by kibwen »

sugarpimpdorsey wrote: post #43
kibwen wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The risk is not the quality of the work that the person might do. The risk is that you now have a state-controlled North Korean asset operating inside your security perimeter.

It's 2025, it's all about zero-trust now. Can't be inside the security perimeter when there is no security perimeter. Hiring mischievous North Koreans is fully in line with your CIO's new priorities, which she heard about at a conference once.

The reason that North Korea targets IT roles in particular is precisely because they're the weak link in zero-trust implementations. Someone, somewhere, has the unfettered rights to access the production database, and they're in the IT department.
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