A US woman has been sent to prison for more than eight years over an elaborate scheme to steal the identities of American workers and pass them to North Koreans.
Christina Chapman admitted to stealing the identities of 68 US citizens, then helping foreign workers use those identities to pose as Americans and gain employment at over 300 separate companies.
Investigators say the “staggering” scheme used the stolen identities to generate $17m (£12.5m) in funds that were sent back to North Korea. Chapman claimed to be unaware that she was helping the North Koreans, officials say.
US Attorney for Washington DC General Jeanine Pirro warned companies to be alert for similar North Korean plots.
Chapman, 50, pleaded guilty in February to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and money laundering conspiracy. On Thursday, she was handed a 102-month prison sentence.
She was arrested in May 2024 in Arizona, and charged alongside three North Korean citizens.
All three North Koreans have ties to the North Koreans Munitions Industry Department, according to the US State Department, which noted that the organisation handles ballistic missile and weapons production for North Korea.
According to US officials, the money raised was sent directly to the country’s nuclear weapons programme.
“North Korea is not just a threat to the homeland from afar. It is an enemy within. It is perpetrating fraud on American citizens, American companies, and American banks,” Pirro said on Thursday.
“It is a threat to Main Street in every sense of the word,” she said, adding that North Korea used the funds “to buy munitions to be used against us”.
The plot orchestrated by Chapman duped 309 American companies, including several on the Fortune 500 list such as Nike, and two international firms.
“The call is coming from inside the house. If this happened to these big banks, to these Fortune 500, brand name, quintessential American companies, it can or is happening at your company,” Pirro continued.
“You are the first line of defense against the North Korean threat.”
Chapman admitted to running “laptop farms” from her homes in Arizona and Minnesota, where she would log into computers issued by the companies so that it appeared the North Korean workers from other countries were physically in the US.
She would then help the workers remotely connect to the laptops, and also help them to receive their wages from the firms.
The Arizona laptop farm “was operating at such a high volume” that she hired two people to help her, according to officials.
A photo released of the operation shows how she stored the devices on shelves, with notes with identifying information of each company and the stolen identity associated with each laptop.
Chapman claimed to not know that she was working with North Koreans, according to prosecutors, and “did not specifically attempt to raise revenue for the benefit of North Korea”.
But over an eight-month period, she sent 35 separate packages to Dandong, China – a city on the border with North Korea. Pirro said that she believes Chapman was well aware that she was helping the US adversary.
In addition to China, she also shipped company laptops to Pakistan, the UAE, and Nigeria.
Chapman was paid $176,850 for the conspiracy, which began in October 2020 and ended in 2023. As part of her sentence, she was ordered to hand over the money, as well as over $284,000 in profits that were due to be paid to the North Koreans.
Prosecutors had sought a tough sentence, partly due to her continuing insistence to investigators that her work was “legitimate”.
“Despite entering a guilty plea…. defendant does not seem to understand the full extent of her culpability in the criminal conspiracy,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memo.
The investigation was aided by the FBI, which warned in a statement that North Korea has earned “millions of dollars for its nuclear weapons program by victimizing American citizens, businesses, and financial institutions”.
“However, even an adversary as sophisticated as the North Korean government can’t succeed without the assistance of willing US citizens like Christina Chapman,” said the FBI.