Good day everyone,
I hope you are all having a good day, welcome to CryptoGod-1's blog on all things crypto. In this post I will be looking at a Nashville resident known as Matthew Knoot, who has been indicted under federal charges for allegedly aiding North Korea’s (DPRK) ballistic weapons programs.
Matthew Knoot
A man from Nashville, Tennessee, known as Matthew Knoot, has been indicted under federal charges for his role in allegedly assisting North Korea's ballistic weapons program as part of a massive IT jobs fraud scheme. This comes via a new U.S. Department of Justice press release. The press release notes how North Korea employs “thousands of skilled IT workers to live abroad” each year where they generally earn up to $300,000 per annum. This salary is then funnelled back into North Korea and it is used to support its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs.
Between July 2022 and August 2023, Knoot reportedly ran a “laptop farm” which assisted a number of North Korean workers. They used this laptop farm to obtain illicit jobs in United States and British tech companies, and the companies believed they were hiring U.S. based employees. The press release noted:
“Knoot allegedly assisted them in using a stolen identity to pose as a U.S. citizen; hosted company laptops at his residences; downloaded and installed software without authorization on such laptops to facilitate access and perpetuate the deception; and conspired to launder payments for the remote IT work, including to accounts tied to North Korean and Chinese actors.”
Knoot is a resident of Nashville and he was purportedly paid an undisclosed amount of money for his role in the scheme on a monthly basis. His IT scheme has reportedly cost victim IT companies over $500,000. Knoot faces a number of charges, including aggravated identity theft and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, which would see the alleged Tennessee fraudster face up to two decades in federal prison. U.S. Attorney Henry C. Leventis for the Middle District of Tennessee stated:
“Today’s indictment, charging the defendant with facilitating a complex, multi-year scheme that funnelled hundreds of thousands of dollars to foreign actors, is the most recent example of our office’s commitment to protecting the United States’ national security interests.”
Have a great day.
Peace. CryptoGod-1.
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