Internet
KCNA Watch attracts bans in North and South Korea
Oct 29th
How it should look: KCNA Watch viewed from an unrestricted Internet connection
KCNA Watch, a website that collects articles, pictures and video from the Korean Central News Agency, isn’t making friends on either side of the Korean border.
A communications regulator in South Korea has blocked access to the service while the North Korean government has restricted access to its services from New Zealand, apparently due to the way KCNA Watch collects its stories.
The South Korea block, which happened on Friday, was reported over the weekend by NK News. KCNA Watch currently operates as a part of NK News.
Visitors to the site More >
South Korea’s Internet only “partly free,” says Freedom House
Oct 12th
Despite living in one of the most wired societies in the world, South Korean Internet users enjoy a “partly free” Internet due to government censorship of content, according to the results of a global survey on Internet freedom.
Censorship of content, which includes many websites that carry North Korean content, has shot up in recent years.
The government’s own figures show 25,706 items were blocked in the first six months of 2013, compared to 39,296 sites in all of 2012. Five years ago in 2008, just 4,731 sites were blocked.
The censorship led Freedom House to score the country 32 points in its annual More >
South suspects North Korean hackers hit on June 25
Jul 17th
The South Korean government says it suspects hackers in North Korea were behind a series of cyber attacks last month.
The attacks took place on June 25, the anniversary of the beginning of the Korean war, and continued for several days. When they began, several South Korean government and private-run websites were defaced or taken offline.
The main evidence behind the South’s accusations was the discovery of an IP address linked to North Korea and similarities in software code between the June 25 attack and previous attacks, the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning, said Tuesday.
IP addresses are unique numeric identifiers More >
“DarkSeoul” behind some South Korean hacks, says Symantec
Jun 28th
A hacking group called “DarkSeoul” was behind some of this week’s attacks on South Korean websites, according to researchers at computer security company Symantec.
The company says the group was responsible for denial of service attacks on South Korean government websites and can be directly linked to similar actions in the past.
“We can now attribute multiple previous high-profile attacks to the DarkSeoul gang over the last 4 years against South Korea, in addition to yesterday’s attack,”Symantec said on its Security Response blog. “These attacks include the devastating Jokra attacks in March 2013 that wiped numerous computer hard drives at South Korean banks and television broadcasters, as well More >
Analyzing the June 25 DDoS attacks
Jun 27th
Tuesday’s series of denial of service attacks on major North Korean websites caused delays and frustration for legitimate users but doesn’t appear to have been as large or successful as the first round of attacks in late March and early April this year.
Analysis by NorthKoreaTech.org of data related to the attacks shows the so-called “OpNorthKorea” mission was most successful during its first few hours and then appeared to slowly tail off.
Denial of service attacks involve firing off requests for pages to websites. If enough requests can be sent, the site ends up overloaded and no one gets anything. Success of More >
Hackers attack North, South Korean websites
Jun 25th
The previously announced June 25 attack on North Korean websites by hackers working under the “Anonymous” name took an unexpected turn on Tuesday when several South Korean sites were hit with attacks. The actions coincided with the release of what hackers said were stolen files on American military personnel.
The North Korean attack did start as scheduled and appears to have been initially successful. Most major North Korean websites are either inaccessible or difficult to access, indicating they are being hit by a denial of service attack. This involves overwhelming a web server with requests so it gets tied up and More >
Anonymous counts down to planned DPRK cyber attack
Jun 24th
Members of the international hacking collective Anonymous look set to launch a planned cyber attack on North Korean Internet properties at midnight local Korean time on Monday night.
The group has also promised to make public some details of documents gained from a claimed attack on North Korean internal servers.
In messages posted to Twitter on Monday, Anonymous members indicated the countdown for the next stage in their “OpNorthKorea” series of attacks is unchanged.
A Twitter message posted by an Anonymous member posted at around 1pm Korea time on Monday.
The exact nature of the attacks is not known, but Anonymous typically uses denial of More >
KCNA hits back at Anonymous
Jun 22nd
The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) has attacked claims by international hacker collective Anonymous that it managed to steal North Korean military secrets from computer servers. The attack came in a commentary on Friday, just days before Anonymous plans to launch a cyber-attack on North Korean websites.
Earlier this week, a Twitter user claiming to represent Anonymous hackers said the group had managed to infiltrate North Korean servers on the country’s domestic intranet and access sensitive information.
“We completed serveral attacks on your internal Websites and inside your local intranets,” the group said in a message posted to the Pastebin website, which allows More >
WRN ends Voice of Korea relays
Jun 22nd
London-based World Radio Network appears to have ended its relays of the Voice of Korea, North Korea’s international shortwave radio service.
The broadcasts appeared in May and were being recorded by WRN from Voice of Korea’s daily English-language shortwave broadcasts. Voice of Korea puts out a daily hour-long program in English each day and it’s relayed several times to listeners around the globe.
The shortwave signal meant sometimes poor audio quality, but the WRN website was the only place on the Internet offering the program on-demand. Voice of Korea’s own website has news and music clips but not the entire broadcast.
At the time, WRN More >
Anonymous claims hack of North Korean servers
Jun 22nd
A poster produced by an Anonymous member advertising the group’s planned June 25 attack on North Korean websites.
A Twitter user claiming to speak on behalf of the Anonymous hacker collective says members of the group have succeeded in breaking into North Korean computer servers and stealing military documents.
“Previously we said we would penetrate the intranet and private networks of North Korea. And we were successful,” the group wrote in a news release posted on Pastebin, a website that allows anonymous posting of text documents.
“Your major missile documentation and residents, military documents show down is already in progress. Your attempt to cover More >
