Electronic warfare
Report: Stronger GPS jammer developed
Sep 9th
North Korea has developed a powerful jammer that can disrupt GPS (Global Positioning System) satellite signals over a range of “more than 100 kilometers,” according to a South Korean government report, Yonhap News said Tuesday.
News of the jamming equipment was included in a report submitted to South Korea’s parliamentary committee on defense this week, the news agency said.
The South Korean capital lies about 50 kilometers from the border region so a jammer with such range could disrupt or wipe out GPS signals in Seoul and the surrounding area. The city and region up to the border is littered with military More >
VOK on US hacking
Aug 4th
The Voice of Korea, North Korea’s international radio broadcaster, recently aired a commentary that took aim at several hacking incidents in the U.S., but the true aim of the piece appears to be the U.S. Department of Defense’s recently published Strategy for Operating in Cyberspace.
The U.S. document, a declassified version of which is available online, brings together cyber strategies and thinking throughout the DoD. The classified version also says major cyber attacks can constitute acts of war, according to reports.
The VOK commentary begins with the hack of Fox News’ Twitter stream that saw a message posted that U.S. President Barack More >
North Korea behind March web attacks, says McAfee
Jul 6th
North Korea or parties closely tied to the country were almost certainly behind the March cyber attacks that took down several South Korean websites, according to a report from computer security company McAfee.
The report contains a detailed analysis of the attacks and how they were carried out.
Working with the governments of both South Korea and the U.S., the company reverse engineered the computer code used in the attacks to uncover its inner workings.
Infected computers that launched the attacks were controlled by two tiers of command server, communications between the systems was encrypted in several different systems and the whole network More >
Report: DPRK again jams GPS signals
Mar 7th
North Korea attempted to jam GPS (global positioning system) satellite navigation signals in South Korea on Friday afternoon, according to a Yonhap News report that cited an unnamed South Korean defense official.
Jamming is the act of broadcasting a signal on the same channel as the intended target service so as to confuse or interfere with reception.
The report said GPS disruption was recorded in some devices in the capital Seoul and two cities closer to the border, Incheon and Paju.
One report said the disruption caused some cell phones to show the wrong time. No more details were provided, but that would More >
Rodong Sinmun on IT psychological warfare
Dec 16th
Rodong Sinmun, the DPRK’s national daily newspaper of the Workers’ Party of Korea, attacked the U.S. on Tuesday for “waging a vicious psychological warfare on the basis of modern science and technology.”
The article, an English synopsis of which was reported by KCNA, said the U.S. is using it to attack “anti-imperialist independent countries.”
It’s the first time in a while that psychological warfare has come up on KCNA, but the article is frustratingly lacking in specifics of the specific actions it is complaining about.
U.S. intelligence gathering bodies and their affiliated institutions are now busy widely using modern scientific and technological means More >
North Korea Appears Capable of Jamming GPS Receivers
Oct 15th
The Voice of America has an interesting story on the jamming of GPS signals along the border region. The jamming signals are apparently from North Korea and rendered GPS systems in the region unusable.
This week, the South Korea Communications Commission informed lawmakers that between August 23 and 25, signals emanating from near the North Korean city of Kaesong interfered with South Korean GPS military and civilian receivers on land and at sea.
In theory, the jamming of GPS isn’t difficult. All that is required is a signal powerful enough to disrupt or override the relatively weak signals being received from space. The More >
DPRK concerned about US electronic warfare capability
Sep 20th
The Voice of America has got its hands on a military manual said to have been smuggled from North Korea. The manual, which was apparently published in 2005, reveals Pyongyang’s concern about electronic warfare technology used by the United States and South Korea, reports VOA. The document also indicates North Korea’s military uses radar-absorbing paint and other stealth tactics to conceal its weapons.
VOA has also posted the manual as a document on Scribd.
Full Story: VOA
North Korea’s Cyber-warfare Capability
Sep 9th
38 North, the Web site of the US Korea Institute at SAIS has a piece on North Korea’s cyber warfare capabilities.
The article provides some of the background to claims that North Korea has been training computer programmers and hackers in the black arts of cyber warfare. It also looks at some of the obstacles the country faces, such as lack of a stable electricity supply, and concludes:
Absent these developments, we should regard North Korean cyber capabilities in the same light we consider its other forays into advanced military systems—strong interest and ragged, self-made technologies, accompanied by bluster and exaggeration.
Full story: More >
