The wider scheme allegedly involves thousands of North Korean IT workers who use false, stolen, and borrowed identities from people in the US and other countries to get hired and work remotely for US firms.

The indictement says the defendants and others working with them generated at least $88m (£51.5m) for the North Korean regime over a six-year period.

The prosecutors say the suspects worked for two North Korean-controlled companies – China-based Yanbian Silverstar and Russia-based Volasys Silverstar.

They were among a group of 130 North Korean IT workers employed by the two firms where they were internally referred to as “IT Warriors”, according to the US Department of Justice.

The suspects were allegedly ordered to seek salaries of $10,000 a month from their US employers.

On top of the monthly wage, they would also raise funds for the North Korean regime by stealing valuable company information and threatening to leak it unless the employer made an extortion payment.

The group is now facing wire fraud, money laundering, identity theft and other charges.

Aside from using stolen identities to avoid detection, prosecutors said they paid people residing in the US to receive, set up, and host laptops provided by the US employers.

They would then instruct those US residents to install remote access software allowing them to appear to be working from the US when they were actually overseas.

Investigators believe the suspects are in North Korea making it unlikely that they will ever face justice.

Still, the US State Department has announced that it will offer a reward of up to $5m for anyone who can provide more information on the suspects as well as Yanbian and Volasys.

US officials have not named the American companies targeted in the scheme.

“While we have disrupted this group and identified its leadership, this is just the tip of the iceberg,” said Ashley T. Johnson, special agent in charge of the FBI’s field office in St Louis.

“The government of North Korea has trained and deployed thousands of IT workers to perpetrate this same scheme against US companies every day.”

His abrupt exit from the company – which owns brands including Vauxhall, Jeep, Fiat, Peugeot and Chrysler – comes two months after Stellantis issued a profit warning.

Last week, the firm also announced plans to close its Vauxhall van making factory in Luton, putting about 1,100 jobs at risk.

Before his resignation, Mr Tavares was one of the most powerful people in the global motor industry.

In a statement announcing Mr Tavares’ departure, Henri de Castries, Stellantis’ senior independent director said: “Stellantis’ success since its creation has been rooted in a perfect alignment between the reference shareholders, the board and the chief executive.

“However, in recent weeks different views have emerged which have resulted in the board and the chief executive coming to today’s decision.”

Mr Tavares had a reputation as a ruthless cost-cutter.

He made his name at Renault, working with the colourful and controversial chief executive, Carlos Ghosn, before taking the top job at PSA Group.

At the time, the French group was close to bankruptcy. He was credited with turning it around before orchestrating a merger with Fiat Chrysler to form Stellantis in 2021, creating a global giant.

“He was known for being able to turn around companies that were troubled,” Hans Greimel, Asia editor at Automotive News said.

However, Mr Tavares’ position has been undermined recently by a dramatic fall in sales and profits at the company.

“Critics would say he was just cost-cutting too much and delaying products and also hurting quality,” said Mr Greimel.

In September, Stellantis had issued a profit warning after it reported a sharp drop in sales in North America.

Dealers found themselves struggling to shift a glut of unsold vehicles, which customers simply didn’t want to buy.

The company was criticised for producing too many cars of the wrong type, failing to adapt to changing customer tastes and losing ground to more dynamic rivals.

Prof David Bailey from the Birmingham Business School said that while there is “huge turmoil in the car industry generally” Stellantis has its own “particular problems”.

He said: “What’s really, really driving that, I think, is the situation in North America where they’ve had appalling results, a very dated product line-up, rising inventories and slipping market share as a result of which all the stakeholders involved – suppliers, dealers, workers, investors – are deeply unhappy.

“I think that has penetrated the board and made his position untenable.”

Stellantis’ share price has fallen by 40% since the start of this year, a far worse performance than its rivals.

Mr Tavares had already agreed to step down in 2026, rather than extending his contract – a move that arguably weakened him significantly.

Stellantis said it now expected to appoint a new chief executive by the middle of next year.

In the meantime, it said it will set up a new interim executive committee, headed by the firm’s chair John Elkann who is a member of the powerful Agnelli family of Italian industrialists.

Mr Elkann controls a significant voting stake in the group on behalf of his family.

He is the one currently leading the search for Mr Tavares’ successor and his views will be crucial in shaping the future of the automotive giant.

Mr Tavares frequently made headlines in the UK by casting doubt over the future of Vauxhall operations, linking it to issues such as Brexit and government plans to force car makers to build more electric cars.

It is not yet clear whether his departure will affect the planned closure of Stellantis’ Luton plant.Stellantis’s Vauxhall plant in Luton currently builds petrol and diesel vans and had been due to start making its medium-sized Vivaro electric van from 2025, before the decision to close it.

The company is now planning to combine its electric van production at its other UK plant in Ellesmere Port in Cheshire.

In Europe, Stellantis has suffered the same fate as many other manufacturers – coming under pressure from Chinese rivals at a time when take-up of electric vehicles has been more sluggish than expected.

A tie-up with the China’s Leapmotor may reap dividends, but is in its early stages.

On what the change at the top means for Luton, Prof Bailey said: “I think everything is up in the air. Whether or not that could be reversed I don’t know. One would hope but I suspect that that has gone sadly.

“…I don’t think there are any guarantees about the future whatsoever of Stellantis’s operations in the UK.”