How North Koreans Are Infiltrating American Businesses

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

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Luke Vargas (0:34)

A journal investigation finds that thousands of North Korean operatives have landed jobs at American companies. Plus, big businesses start reeling in hundreds of millions of dollars in tariff refunds, and we'll look at whether American chatbots are towing Beijing's party line.

Stu Woo (0:52)

AI is like a giant blender that gobbles up everything on the internet, and it makes a smoothie. But because there's propaganda from authoritarian governments, well, a bit of that propaganda makes its way into the smoothie.

Luke Vargas (1:04)

It's Thursday, August 13th. I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal, and here is the AM Edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today. Thousands of North Korean operatives are using fake and stolen identities in order to land remote jobs at US companies, funneling hundreds of millions of dollars back to the regime.

SPEAKER_4 (1:28)

We get a lot of imposter candidates, particularly North Koreans, posing as people that they're not. So one of the tests that we do is trying to get them to say, Kim Jong-un is a fat, ugly pig. Could you say that for me?

Sorry, no, Kim Jong-un, the leader of North Korea.

Luke Vargas (1:53)

Leaked data, interviews and never-before-seen videos obtained by the Wall Street Journal reveal how a single team of these workers infiltrated at least eight companies in just a few months.

SPEAKER_5 (2:03)

You tell people North Koreans are working for American companies, and then the first question is, how is that possible?

SPEAKER_6 (2:10)

From our perspective, it likely is thousands of IT workers who are looking for jobs in the United States. We're talking about millions and millions of dollars going towards North Korea. I see them in governments.

SPEAKER_7 (2:21)

I see them at defense contractors.

SPEAKER_6 (2:23)

I see them at banking institutions. These IT workers are everywhere.

SPEAKER_7 (2:26)

They would schedule up interviews and all I had to do was just show up, and then you get one of those remote laptops sent to you. There's no way I'm the only guy doing this.

Luke Vargas (2:33)

According to recent estimates, this group of undercover North Korean operatives earned $800 million from US companies that's been funneled back to Kim Jong-un's regime. To get hired, they steal identities from US citizens, have American facilitators, and the FBI warns that in some instances, the IT workers have even hacked their employers. Intrigued? You're going to want to watch the journal's brand new documentary on the topic, which we've left a link to in our show notes.

In a bid to salvage the US-Mexico-Canada agreement, which President Trump has threatened to walk away from, Mexico appears to be giving up hope of enjoying tariff-free treatment on automobiles made in the country. Instead, it's now pushing to ensure that levies on its products are lower than goods from outside of North America. Currently a 25% tariff is charged on non-US content in automobiles from Canada and Mexico, with Mexico asking for a 5-10% levy instead. The White House didn't comment, while the Mexican Embassy in Washington declined to comment.

And speaking of tariffs, a number of big US companies have started to receive refunds for the Trump administration's tariffs that were deemed illegal by the Supreme Court. And in some cases, that money is providing a boost to earnings. Among the biggest refunds reported so far is Apple's, which totals nearly $2.2 billion, while companies like Nike, FedEx and Amazon have gotten back hundreds of millions of dollars. Speaking to investors recently, Apple's Tim Cook and Amazon CFO Brian Olsowsky shared what they planned to do with the money.

SPEAKER_8 (4:09)

Last year, we made a $600 billion commitment to the US over four years. And now, as we said before, we plan to reinvest the tariff refunds we've received into the US.

SPEAKER_9 (4:21)

We have identified a limited set of circumstances where we can trace that we pass specific import charges on to customers. And when we receive those refunds, we will proactively contact affected customers and automatically issue refunds to them.

Otherwise, like other large retailers, we will utilize refunds, continue to invest in low prices for customers.

Luke Vargas (4:42)

Through the end of last month, US. Customs and Border Protection has received just over a quarter million refund applications. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz may continue to be severely disrupted months on from the start of the US. War in Iran. But results from shipping giants, Merck and Hapag Lloyd this morning suggest that global trade is humming along just fine. Merck raised its full-year guidance, saying its steps to recover higher costs from the conflict had been successful, while Hapag Lloyd said that strong Asian exports and improved US demand had helped to overcome operational disruptions. However, Hapag Lloyd has more work to do to return to last year's profitability, posting a more than $170 million loss over the past two quarters.