North Korean Hackers Rival CIA? 521
Bitchslap_69 writes "According to a report in the South Korean paper Cho Sun Ilbo, North Korea 'employs 500-600 hackers who are tasked with hacking into computer networks and disabling enemy command and communication systems.' The person making this claim is Dr. Byeon Jae-jeong of the South Korean Defense Ministry's Agency for Defense Development (ADD). He claims the DPRK hackers to be 'equal to that of the CIA,' whatever that might mean."
Sure, maybe the CIA (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sure, maybe the CIA (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Sure, maybe the CIA (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Sure, maybe the CIA (Score:2)
ADD? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:ADD? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:ADD? (Score:2)
Re:ADD? (Score:2)
Re:ADD? (Score:2)
I don't recall them appearing in multiple threads from the glitch, however.
Maybe the article ID numbers and times could provide a hint.
hawk
Re:ADD? (Score:2)
a few questions (Score:5, Funny)
2. what good do mad hacking skills do you when you've just been assigned farm duty?
3. How can you hack with out access to doritos and pepsi?
Re:a few questions (Score:2)
They kidnapped Japanese people and brought them there so they could train their spies how to fit into Japanese society.
If they wanted, they could certainly kidnap some hackers from Germany, China or elsewhere..
Or if geeks do as geeks are, promising them some hot Korean Babes the hackers might come for free, as it were...
Re:a few questions (Score:3, Informative)
How can Kim Jong Il be the only one with internet in North Korea, what about the sysadmin. Or what about the nerdy North Korean teenager that comes in and cleans out his spyware. Or how can he Pwn in Star Craft without internet. I guess he can go to Lan Parties, but that gets old, especially when your Monitor is like 1000 pounds.
Re:a few questions (Score:2)
How do they get trained hackers? (Score:5, Informative)
See for example their history of doing the same to acquire knowledge about the outside world:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2087627/ [msn.com]
This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2)
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:3, Insightful)
Perhaps because politicians want them to be scared in order to be able to better push their objectives? S
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2)
Yay, at least someone gets it! The demonising of N. Korea has been escalating for two or three years now, softening us up for the up-coming war. Mark my words, we'll be at war in North Korea within two years. Many (inc. me) observed the exact same thing with respect to Iraq.
Propaganda. Textbook example, that's all this is. Next they'll be telling us they
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:5, Interesting)
Iraq was supposed to be a pushover, with terrain perfectly suited for the U.S. (see Gulf War I), had only Russia as a half-hearted partner.
North Korea has been girding for this fight ever since the Korean War armistice. They have a major Asian capital held hostage by 50 years worth of artillery emplacements. They are also right in China's backyard, and China, while completely uninterested in the North Korean regime, doesn't want some flood of hungry refugees when they are busy dealing with millions of their own rural workers looking for jobs. That's why none of this has gone to the U.N.: China has enough power to keep the U.S. from steamrolling them; Russia had no choice but to let Iraq get smacked around.
The U.S. would certainly prevail in a North Korean war, but millions of Koreans would die, with untold damage to a major economy. Samsung, LG, Hyundai, etc., are real economic players [try naming an Iraqi multinational]. Now, Japan getting nuked by North Korean warheads might be equally disastrous, so there is at least one way this could spiral out of control, but this is a war that NOBODY wants.
That said, the Bush administration has been bungling the situation from day 1, particularly because the proper order of threats was 1) North Korea, 2a) Al-qaeda 2b) Pakistan 3) Iran 4) Iraq, and they started at #4, put #2b on the wrong list, and by attacking #4 managed to spook #3 and #1 enough to make the situation even trickier. Their only policy achievement in NK is a totally non-functional diplomatic arrangement that they screw up with the most childish kind of namecalling.They may very well bungle enough to get the war they don't want.
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2, Interesting)
right. North Korea is a great country to live in.
Liberals are funny. They would rather have famine than an attempt to save these people. 1,000,000 people could be starving in the hands of a maniacal dictator, but still the U.S shouldn't get involved (in fact, they are the ones that are the dictatorship).
if the U.S was actually that bad, there w
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:3, Insightful)
No, we'd rather do something OTHER than invading and killing untold thousands and/or start a war with a nuclear power. See how you felt on 9.11? That's how other people feel when you attack them. Iraq was completely predictable, and you want to incite more hatred? The very thing that led to 9.11? Are you fucking insane or something?
The U.S. even allows left-wing propaganda such as farenheit 9/11 to be played in movie theaters across t
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:3, Interesting)
Read a little about what happens in N. Korea, from the people who have escaped. It'll make your skin crawl.
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2)
So? It doesn't justify a war. Some of the things you guys have done in the last three years has made MY skin crawl. Not on the same level to be sure, but you have no right to kill tens of thousands of civilians and many more soldiers like you just did in Iraq. Even heard of the concept of learning from your mistakes? People do not like being invaded and will fight back!!. Go read a history book you t
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2)
Actually, when the US was gearing up for the invasion of Iraq, I remember thinking that they'd have a *heck* of a stronger case for invading North Korea.
Unfortunately, North Korea almost certainly *do* have WMDs, which makes them a lot more dangerous to invade (*that* is the irony); and that's not even starting on the massive risk to South Korea, or the danger from a Chinese
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2)
Except Iraq was far more profitable, in terms of strategic gain and finacial grabbing. About nine billion US has gone missing, and oil was pumped unmetered for almost a year. By the companies that back up your current administration just now. The people I know who served over there were guarding oil assets, and I know several folk who are leaving the army
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't get why people worry about remote possibilities when there are real threats just around the corner.
Same reason I drink Diet Coke with my cheeseburger.
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2)
My roommate & i laughed over that one for weeks.
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:This just in, North Korea has an army too! (Score:2)
N.
WMD? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:WMD? (Score:2)
this isn't news (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:this isn't news (Score:4, Interesting)
And back on topic. The story is total crap. Yes I'm sure they have an elite hacking crew of 4 people (2 of which remote in from Romania) and have access to all the greatest Tandy 2k technology. This is nothing more than typical NK we are super propaganda. Remember Total Destruction is Inevertibly Inevertible!
Re:this isn't news (Score:2)
They are a big exporter of long range missles, etc. If they can smuggle huge amounts of arms technology around the globe they can certainly pick up a few WinTel or Linux boxes..
Food (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Food (Score:2)
Perhaps instead of approving US$ 500,000,000,000 defence budget to deter a threat they create to intimidate their own people they should consider giving their people some medical care and social security, so they don't sleep in streets (or chose your favourite activity).
Same thing, different package.
Re:Food (Score:2)
There is a point where people just see a lot of zeros. 500,000,000,000 and 5,000,000,000,000 look about the same but on is 10x as large.
Same thing, different package.
Or 150% of the US's total energy costs (electric, gas, jet fuel, natural gas, heating oil ect). It's really funny when people go ape over 50c at the pump but they don't mind spending thousands of dollars every year on the
Re:Food (Score:3, Interesting)
You think that they lack funds to feed people? Yeah sure, just like Ethiopia lacked the funds and ability to feed their people in the 80's and 90's. Oh wait, I forgot about the hundreds of tons of food that just rotted on the docks while the ruling class held parties and banquets that cost mill
well.. (Score:4, Interesting)
And, second of all: Having experienced the wrath of korean hax0r's myself, while playing Counter-Strike, I can easily believe this.
Re:well.. (Score:2)
Re:well.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm pretty sure that the CIA's job these days is just to tell Bush whatever it is he wants to hear.
According to this New Yorker article [newyorker.com], Bush and the CIA don't like each other. Bush basically made his own personal Intelligence Agency inside the Pentagon. The President pretends that this "task force" doesn't have to provide answers about their acts to Congress.From the article:
zerg (Score:2)
Now why he would want to say something like that is, IMO, a more interesting question...
why is south korea saying this? (Score:2, Interesting)
Whatever! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Whatever! (Score:2)
Who moderated that funny?
I was searching for a way of calling the original Dr. Byeon Jae-jeong quote 'paranoid ravings'. You did it so much better.
Re:Whatever! (Score:3, Interesting)
I think it's a kinda funny reference to http://realultimatepower.net/ [realultimatepower.net]. It's what Wikipedia calls an Intenet Phenomenon [wikipedia.org].
*cough* (Score:2, Funny)
this guy is not credible (Score:4, Insightful)
This is a joke. If North Korea did try a "cyber attack" on America we could cut off their internet with a pair of scissors. The average cable modem user in America has more bandwidth than their entire country. It's hard to afford computers and network access when 99.9% of your GDP goes to support your military and feed your people.
Re:this guy is not credible (Score:2)
I highly doubt that any country had internet connections as considered today in 80es, but all they needed back then was one telephone line.
> This is a joke. If North Korea did try a "cyber a
Re:this guy is not credible (Score:2)
But I would wager that if we asked, with reason, NK would have no sat access within an hour.
On a total side note: WHAT THE HELL IS UP WITH ALL THE AC POSTS! You know the ones I mean -- the spam from other threads.
I don't get it: WHY? There is no possible benifit. *sigh* Never mind. I forget that some people get off by being prats.
Ever heard about the term botnet ? (Score:4, Informative)
The country itself need not have enough bandwidth. Distributed DoS could take down a box using american zombie PCs. And let me tell you, there is no dearth of those. An attack from the inside of the network is perfectly possible - ever read Andromeda Strain [yahoo.com] ?. A compromised machine inside your network would need you to have a LOT of scissors :)
> It's hard to afford computers and network access when 99.9% of your GDP goes to support your military and feed your people.Cyber warfare is military funded ... It is military without all the blood and guts routine - with all the Art of War [chinapage.com] fire tactics.
Re:this guy is not credible (Score:2)
have a "single" internet connection in 1981.. hmmmmm and yet here we are!
ARPAnet dates from the late 60's and forgetting Babbages' failures, there have been industrial uses for computers from the last 40's and 50's and so while perhaps you can only think of computers in the context of a PC (a personal computer), NK certainly could have had a technology "hacking" team since the 50's or 60's (if not before).
Turning out 1
Re:this guy is not credible (Score:2)
Wait. What do you mean they won't take Kim Chee? Dammit, they know we're good for it!
Re:this guy is not credible (Score:2)
Or South?
I can believe south.
North Korea vs. South Korea (Score:4, Insightful)
Night vs. Day.
South Korea is the most "connected" nation in the world, with some 80% of households having broadband, and the average broadband connection being 4 MBits/s.
North Korea, well, can hardly feed themselves.
Take a look at North Korea vs South Korea in this NASA "Earth at night" image [nasa.gov]; it's really telling. South Korea is amongst brightest countries in the world, while North Korea is just this sudden dark, dark "void" sitting conspicuously between South Korea and China.
Easy fix (Score:2)
Dupe(?) + My thoughts.... (Score:3, Interesting)
If the CIA or any other world famous security organization have their act together, all the 'good stuff' is on an internal computer network that has ABSOLUTELY NO CONNECTION TO THE INTERNET (or any other form of 'at large' telecommunications). This is very important as it is impossible to break into such a system -- there is no 'front door' to use to gain access. The usual procedure is to have two computers side by side: one on the secure internal network and the other connected to the internet/unsecure network. A human being is required to type information from the insecure PC to the secure one and vice versa. In this setup, the only way the secrets can get out is if the human in this situation is incompetent, being blackmailed (and told no one who can help them), or an outright traitor -- there are no other alternatives.
There is a slight chance of passively picking up the secret stuff with a so called TEMPEST attack but surely the IT people at these kind of organizations have already taken measures to make such attacks effectively impossible.
Re:Dupe(?) + My thoughts.... (Score:2)
Oh wait, I just described the world wide web.
Re:Dupe(?) + My thoughts.... (Score:2)
When I worked for the Air Force, we had to work in a copper sheilded building; and that was just for 'Sensitive' computing. The folks who work with secret stuff had a fully modern and secure facility located on a remote hill with unobstructed views all round. I haven't seen the compu
Sketchy Information (Score:2)
Re:Sketchy Information (Score:2)
This is indeed true when it comes to important matters. And the info in it changes as the geopolitical situation changes.
If you ever get a chance, take a diff between a pre-2001 edition and a post-2001 edition, especially the parts that deal with military manpower, particularly that of the USA.
Ya, right.. these Leet NK Hax0rs are da b0mb (Score:2)
The Korea Times (Score:2, Informative)
Yes, but our best hackers aren't at the CIA (Score:4, Funny)
Communists don't like ties? (Score:2)
Because.... we all know a hacker is a short-sleeved man with a tie!
Hmm... (Score:2, Funny)
Remember Iraq? (Score:4, Insightful)
Now North Korea has an almost as big army of hackers as US...
Pattern or coincidence?
Re:Remember Iraq? (Score:2)
But NK has access to top Soviet and Chinese Technology and a spy network that could bring them any needed US technology (or that from Japan).
My question is: How the hell would he know? (Score:5, Insightful)
At any rate, how the hell would this guy have any idea how good they are, espically given he can't keep the agencies straight? I mean the NSA is very secretive, they don't say much on how they operate, what particularly they do, etc. The nature of an intelligence agency. What's more, there hasn't been a conflict where any sort of US syber warfare division would have had much to do to demonstrate their prowess.
So we have no information on training, no public demonstrations of capabilities, and no wartime demonstrations. Ok, great, so basically anything we say about it is total specualtion. The US's capability could be anything from three teenagers playing Counterstrike all day to a huge team of the best trained hackers in the world. There's just no way to know.
So it looks like this guy is talking out his ass on the US capabilities, which makes me think he's probably doing the same on North Korean capabilites. I mean they may have lots, they may have none, but who knows?
However it really seems to be of little concern, given that North Korea has little Internet access to their nation. I mean people in the US and Europe tend to take for granted the large number of well connected providers around, that's not the case in NK. It wouldn't take much to totally cut them off from the rest of the Internet.
Besdies, in theory at least, all US military control and all classified data travels on networks physically seperate from the Internet. Goes back to the Kennedy assanation where the government found the PSTN so clogged they couldn't communicate and so worke don getting their own. Today the policy, and hopefulyl the implementation, is an air gap: physical seperation of classified networks from the Internet. So a "cyber attack" might screw a bunch of people with in secure comptuers for a couple days, but it wouldn't stop the B-2s from comming.
Re:My question is: How the hell would he know? (Score:2)
Nope. The NSA is about security, not intel. (See the name? "National Security Agency") Their job is to defend against outside intel organizations.
The CIA is about foreign intel, not specifically human intel. (See the name? "Central Intelligence Agency") In fact, the majority of the CIA's budget goes to electronic or signal intel, not human intelligence, which was a mistake.
Re:My question is: How the hell would he know? (Score:2)
They do both. From their mission statement:
several assumptions has to be made (Score:2)
1. S. Korea knows how good N. Korean hackers are. meaning they've seen their work or have been attacked.
2. S. Korea knows how good CIA hackers are through the same methods.
3. CIA's hacking qualities has to be 'up there' or else making the comparison would be meaningless.
OK, MAYbe (Score:2)
North Korea big scary monster... (Score:5, Insightful)
North Korea is known to be actively trying to achieve nuclear weapons.
North Korea is known to have killed thousands, if not millions of its own people thanks to its goverment (predominately famine).
North Korea is run by a complete and utter barking mad nutter.
So nuclear weapons... that puts them up with first world nations from the... 1940s and 50s. They have a rocket that can't even make it to Japan and their leader is much more interested in self-publicity and oppressing his population than almost anything else.
Having 500 "hackers" trying to compromise networks in the west... well they've been SPECTACULARLY successfull haven't they with all the networks they've caused to fail over the last few years.
North Korea is a Bad Country(tm) but lets not believe what South Korea says. We know that North Korea has no RADAR worth talking of as the US have deployed stealth fighters, which means the radar must be 20+ years out of date.
Backward country, backward leader, backward tech. They could build a huge amount (see South Korea) if they just stopped killing their own people, fortunately for all of us (and unfortunately for N Koreans) their leader appears to quite like doing the killing and posturing, more than actually delivering.
Um (Score:2)
US CIA or South Korean (Score:3, Insightful)
They are not tooting their own horn (Score:2)
Hackers? Not the CIA but US STRATCOM (DoD) (Score:3, Informative)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
I agree with your post, but are you referring to North Korea/Kim Jong-il? I'm no geography buff, but I could swear North Korea was, well, north.
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Maybe you should look at a map of Asia.
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:3, Informative)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
As soon as the north magnetic pole drifts over N. Korea then it will be. That is, until the Earth's magnetic poles flip, at which time it will south of everything.
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Actually, it wasn't known that Korea had nuclear weapons until after the end of the Iraq war - the war ended halfway through 2003 and Korea claimed they had nukes in September 2004.
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Seems to me that the Iraq war is still going on - after all, US troops (and Iraqi civilians) keep on getting attacked and killed there.
Re:War in Iraq (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
"US has less population than Europe, and China dwarves just about anyone on the planet. Should they try an invasion anywhere, they're guaranteed success just because of numbers. Just because we've got technology for "surgical strikes" doesn't mean we can stop everything. What good is a surgical strike going to do against 10,000 people coming after us?" I don't think it is you who doesn't understand how strategy and tactics work. What good are your 10,000 people if I knock down their power stat
Re:War in Iraq (Score:2)
Bar actual *trenches* (they use sandbags?) that sounds pretty much like Iraq to me. The US still doesnt have full control of baghdad.
I know the US soldier deaths to iraqi civilian deaths ratio is still pretty impressive but this just shows the correct conclusion is "Technology means we can kill more of them while losing less of our own" - it still doesnt win a war.
Re:Urgent news flash!! (Score:2)
Re:But could they hack a Gibson? (Score:2)
Yeah, but if you hack a Gibson it turns into an Epiphone.
Re:But could they hack a Gibson? (Score:2)
Evidently not [afterdawn.com].
Re:South scared of North, news at 11 (Score:2)
Two years ago, we received an application from a S.Korean, and I emailed him back advising that we had receieved his application, etc.
Then, it happened: my office account was added to some anti-N.Korean mailing list, run by the applicant. For weeks, I was treated to his views of N.Korea.
Moral of the story: The applicant was not accepted.
Re:South scared of North, news at 11 (Score:2)
To make sure we are on the right side of the impending war. Quite simple really:
Re:C&C Anyone? (Score:2)
So, do these guys just head out into the fields with their laptops and start ringing in little cash signs above their heads or what?
-AC