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North Koreans Secretly Animated Amazon and Max Shows, Researchers Say (wired.com) 32

North Korean animators have been secretly working on major international TV shows, including an Amazon superhero series and an upcoming HBO Max children's anime, according to a report by cybersecurity researchers. The findings, detailed in a report by the Stimson Center think tank's 38 North Project and Google-owned security firm Mandiant, provide a glimpse into how North Korea can use skilled IT workers to raise funds for its heavily sanctioned regime.

Researcher Nick Roy discovered a misconfigured cloud server on a North Korean IP address in December, containing thousands of animation files, including cells, videos, and notes discussing ongoing projects. Some images appeared to be from Amazon's "Invincible" and HBO Max's "Iyanu: Child of Wonder." The server, which mysteriously stopped being used at the end of February, likely allowed work to be sent to and from North Korean animators, according to Martyn Williams, a senior fellow on the 38 North Project. U.S. sanctions prohibit companies from working with North Korean entities, but the researchers say it is unlikely that the companies involved were aware of the animators' origins. The report suggests the contracting arrangement was several steps removed from the major producers.
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North Koreans Secretly Animated Amazon and Max Shows, Researchers Say

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  • by Tailhook ( 98486 )

    Sure.

    It's all good though. Animators in the West are, doubtless, fully on-board with kumbaya one world goodness, so they have what their virtue insisted upon. Enjoy your subsistence level income.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Opportunist ( 166417 )

      Hold on, what animator gets paid a subsistence level income? Is the studio hiring?

    • Tell me why you think animators in the West deserve exclusivity in creating anime.
    • We can all rest comfortably in the knowledge that in five years generative AI will replace all of them. Frankly I consider this to be beneficial as it means that anyone with a quality idea will be able to produce an animated show. The endless cycle of Family Guy knockoffs that networks keep crapping out grew stale five years ago.
    • There was an article on here [slashdot.org] a while back which discussed how fake credentials were being used by North Korea to allow its people to work on remote projects. They were given a fake name, fake skills, fake education, etc, which was then passed to a hiring company who then "vetted" the person without even seeing or talking to them.

      So yes, it is possible the companies didn't know.
      • Possibly. Many companies have ethics training that do strongly encourage one to vet ALL third party suppliers. The reason for such training is because companies can and do ignore such stuff, naively assuming they're immine from legal consequences for what a partner does. Amazon doesn't care though, it's rich, it will just buy more lawyers when the shit hits the fan. Normal companies though are usually quite aware of what they're doing with third party suppliers, partners, and contractors in order to avo

  • by TWX ( 665546 ) on Monday April 22, 2024 @09:25AM (#64414164)

    ...need to be brought against both the principal studios and against the subcontractors. They're not supposed to allow this to occur. If their own supply-chains are so poorly documented that this occurs on any sort of large scale then it's reasonable to pursue penalties on even if on simple negligence.

  • by echo123 ( 1266692 ) on Monday April 22, 2024 @09:56AM (#64414242)

    Focus on the business model. Follow the money. The problem discussed in TFA affects us in our I.T. industry in a major way, as was reported to the slashdots [slashdot.org], and the DOJ warned us about it too. [justice.gov]

    This podcast [darknetdiaries.com] (with written transcript) describes how people like us with good GitHub and LinkedIn histories are impersonated, have our identities stolen, allowing North Koreans working in Russia and China to earn hard currency for the regime with which to buy weapons. Watch out for identity theft, if for no other reason to avoid tax hassles with the IRS for 'earned income' you had no knowledge about.

    As far as I can tell, websites like upwork.com [darknetdiaries.com] are potential markets with North Korean developers for sale.

    Any other ideas where one might hire North Koreans posing as US/EU/UK workers? Inquiring minds would like to know.

    • It's true. Back in the 90’s they impersonated Jerry Seinfeld to infiltrate the writers room at the Japanese game show called Super Terrific Happy Hour. They wrote some good stuff.

  • by kriston ( 7886 ) on Monday April 22, 2024 @09:57AM (#64414246) Homepage Journal

    This isn't a secret. There was a picture book written by an artist doing business in North Korea. In one section he describes seeing displays of art used in animation for foreign countries.

  • So that explains why now I'm seeing Sponge Kim Leader Pants, Party Guy, Kim and Morty, North Park, etc

  • The report suggests the contracting arrangement was several steps removed from the major producers.

    Established companies outsourcing staffing to fly-by-night companies is how many of the H1B visa program abuses came about that I've personally witnessed. The big-name company can often simply blame the obscure outsourcing firm if caught.

    Having corrupt turtles all the way down is a recipe for mutant ninja crime.

    • I've heard there are more slaves now than at any time in history. Of course that might not be true if normalized to a percentage of the work force; but the mere fact that it even still exists is of course awful. We've sanitized slavery by re-naming it as "convict labor" or in this case pushing it overseas and wrapping it in layers to disclaim responsibility.

      • North Korean prisoners don't do animation work. These are regular employees, it's only illegal because of sanctions. They don't get paid much, but it's more than most people in their country make so they're happy with their pay. That isn't slavery any more than Victorian factories with 16 hour shifts and lax safety were slavery.

    • Yep.

      Something similar happened in Japan a few weeks ago when several companies discovered the software contracting companies they were using were, in turn (and illegally) outsourcing to NK-based developers. Two people were arrested in Tokyo because of it.

      This seems to me, at least superficially, that the contractual and legal chain of work was violated down the outsourcing line.

      Someone in that chain of outsourcing is likely going to get investigated big time (for this is not limited to USA's jurisdict

  • When a person gets drunk and plows his car into somebody, killing them, we as a society say "You, drunk person, are NOT innocent; YOU chose to get drunk and therefore YOU are responsible for whatever bad thing YOU DID while you were drunk". We do not permit the drunk killer to say "I'm not guilty because I surrendered control, and then stuff just happened while I was blacked-out".

    When a company outsources, transferring its work to some off-shore provider, NOBODY should allow the company to get away with a c

    • by Xenx ( 2211586 )
      You're mixing multiple difference scenarios, in terms of ownership and liability. There are fundamental differences, though there are problems either way. In the case of Bhopal, there was ownership involved that could/should bring liability to the owners for the accident. I understand that isn't how things played out. I'm merely stating I agree there should be liability in that case.

      When you're contracting out, and do not have ownership of the contracted company, your liability should absolutely be diminis
  • The North Korean government will never reform if connections to the West are withheld at every opportunity. I, for one, applaud business connections with NK, even though they fund an evil agenda. In the long term it can only help.
    • The Sunshine policy didn't work. The North Korean government didn't like how it reduced their power. They are more interested in power than in increasing the opportunities for their people. The North Korean government uses aid to increase its power (by controlling its distribution), and rejects aid or connections that it doesn't control.

      So the Sunshine policy would work great if it made connection to people at lower levels, but since the North Korean government prevents that, it becomes a means to increas
  • They work for each other. They pay each other. They buy houses. They get married and make children that replace them when they get too old to make cels.

Everybody needs a little love sometime; stop hacking and fall in love!

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