An Army soldier stationed at Fort Gordon and two other U.S. nationals pleaded guilty this week to allowing North Korean workers to use their identities to obtain remote work with American companies.
Alexander Paul Travis, 34, pleaded guilty in Augusta Wednesday to one count of wire fraud conspiracy, according to a filing in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Georgia.
Pleading guilty to the same conspiracy charge in the Southern District were Audricus Phagnasay, 24, and Jason Salazar, 30, according to a Justice Department news release.
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea uses the scheme and others to generate revenue to fund its weapons program, in violation of U.S. and United Nations sanctions, authorities said. The widespread scheme has infiltrated Fortune 500 companies, which sometimes find their highest-performing IT staff to actually be teams of North Korean workers.
In announcing the cases, the Justice Department said DPRK remote-worker schemes have impacted more than 136 U.S. companies and generated more than $2.2 million in revenue for the North Korean regime.
Alleged activities at Fort Gordon
Prosecutors said Travis participated in the scheme for more than three years, from 2019-2022, while he was an active-duty solider living at Fort Gordon. During that time, he allowed DPRK IT workers to use his identity to secure employment.
Travis permitted the overseas workers to use his name on resumes with false experience, pass fingerprinting and drug testing and open financial accounts. He also hosted company-issued laptops at his Fort Gordon residence and installed remote-access software so the workers appeared to be logging in from the United States, prosecutors said.
As a result, eight U.S. companies hired one or more of the workers posing as Travis and paid them more than $193,000, while Travis was paid at least $51,397 for his role, according to the release.
The two other defendants committed the same acts but were not linked to Fort Gordon in court filings.
For his role, Phagnasay received at least $3,450, while Salazar received at least $4,500. Salazar’s conduct caused 14 U.S. companies to pay more than $409,000 to the foreign workers using his identity, prosecutors said.
FBI: Better worker vetting needed
Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division said the FBI will continue to expose DPRK’s campaigns to fund its authoritarian regime and weapons program. He urged U.S. businesses to strengthen their worker vetting processes.
“These guilty pleas send a clear message: No matter who or where you are, if you support North Korea’s efforts to victimize U.S. businesses and citizens, the FBI will find you and bring you to justice,” he said.
U.S. Attorney Margaret E. Heap for the Southern District of Georgia said her office is committed to pursuing individuals who seek to harm the United States.
The FBI Augusta Resident Agency is investigating the cases.
