Korea ( South & North ) 01 (May 08 - Nov 10)

[winston]

S.Korean websites attacked by North Korea

South Korean president and defence ministry home pages appear to be inaccessible

SEOUL : South Korea's intelligence service believes North Korea or its sympathisers may have staged a major cyber attack that shut down US and South Korean websites, lawmakers were quoted saying Wednesday.

The attack late Tuesday hit a total of 25 US and South Korean sites -- some of them official -- with those in South Korea shut down for nearly four hours.

"This is not a simple attack by individuals. The attack appeared to have been elaborately prepared and staged by a certain organisation or state," Seoul's National Intelligence Service (NIS) said in a statement.

Yonhap news agency said the NIS, which has launched an investigation, told parliament's intelligence committee that the communist North or people sympathetic to the isolated state may have been to blame.

"The NIS has been telling committee members that North Korea or a pro-North Korean force might be behind the cyber terror," it quoted one legislator as saying.

The committee, which is briefed in private, was reportedly to receive an official report Thursday from the intelligence service. An NIS spokesman said he could not disclose what information was given to committee members.

In its statement the NIS said US authorities were cooperating to track down those responsible for hijacking 12,000 personal computers in South Korea and 8,000 abroad which were exploited as vehicles for the attacks.

"The sites hit yesterday included 14 US sites including government ones," a spokesman for the Korea Information Security Agency told AFP, refusing to confirm a Yonhap report that the White House website was among those targeted.

In Korea, the defence and foreign ministries, the ruling party, parliament and the US-South Korea combined forces military command were among the 11 entities affected.

South Korea is one of the world's most wired countries, with 95 percent of homes having broadband access, according to a recent US survey.

The regulatory Korea Communications Commission said hackers had caused an attack known as a distributed denial of service (DDoS) by planting viruses in thousands of computers.

"Malicious codes which cause DDoS attacks have infected more than 18,000 personal computers," commission official Hwang Chul-Jung told reporters.

Hackers continued to attack some sites Wednesday, he said, adding Internet service providers were distributing a programme to remove the virus.

DDoS attacks involve the sending of huge amounts of data that cause web servers to seize up.

The damage appeared limited.

The defence ministry said the attackers apparently focused on its external network and internal data and secret information remained intact.

Among the private Korean sites infiltrated were a newspaper and two major lenders, Shinhan Bank and Korea Exchange Bank, officials said.

Most sites attacked Tuesday had since returned to normal but some could still not be accessed Wednesday morning.

The Defence Security Command last month reported that the nation's military computer networks were under ever-growing cyber attack, with 95,000 cases reported daily on average.

The command said most were the same as those experienced by ordinary users, but 11 percent were sophisticated attempts to gather intelligence.

The military said last month it would launch a cyber warfare command centre by 2012 to fend off attacks on government and military IT networks from North Korea and other countries.

Experts have said North Korea and China run elite hacker units.

In 2004 hackers based in China used information-stealing viruses to break into the computer systems of Seoul government agencies.

Last year Prime Minister Han Seung-Soo warned against what he said were attempts by Chinese and North Korean computer hackers to obtain state secrets.

- AFP /ls

[winston]

PCs could be hit next in Web attack: South Korea

Cyber attacks linked to N.Korea
Cyber attacks may not have come from North Korea
Fresh cyber attack hits South Korea websites

by Jon Herskovitz

SEOUL (Reuters) - Cyber attacks slowing U.S. and South Korean websites could enter a new phase on Friday by attacking personal computers and wiping out hard disks, a South Korean government agency and web security firm said.

North Korea was originally a prime suspect for launching the cyber attacks, but the isolated state was not named on a list of websites from five countries where the attacks may have originated, the Korea Communications Commission (KCC) said.

The attacks targeting dozens of government and business sites in South Korea and the United States did not cause major damage or security breaches, experts said, but the KCC warned a new phase at 1500 GMT on Friday could cause severe damage to PCs.

Leading South Korean web security firm Ahnlab, which has closely examined the attacks, said the new phase would target data on tens of thousands of infected personal computers.

"The affected computers will not be able to boot and their storage files will be disabled," said Lee Byung-cheol of Ahnlab.

Almost all of the websites that were out of service this week, including the South's Defense Ministry, were up and running while Lee said the damage to Internet locations was dwindling due to better safeguards.

FIVE COUNTRIES NAMED

The KCC said host websites believed behind the original attacks were based in Germany, Austria, Georgia, the United States and South Korea. The location of the hackers behind the attacks was still unknown, it said.

South Korean MPs briefed by the National Intelligence Service said although websites in North Korea were not on the list, Pyongyang was still considered a suspect, Yonhap news agency said.

Internet access is denied to almost everyone in impoverished North Korea, a country that cannot produce enough electricity to light its cities at night. Intelligence sources say leader Kim Jong-il launched a cyber warfare unit several years ago.

Some analysts have questioned the North's involvement, saying it may be the work of industrial spies or pranksters.

The attacks will likely be seen by the North's leadership as a victory for Kim Jong-il -- even if Pyongyang was not involved -- because they added a new dimension to the threats posed by the state, which rattled regional security with a nuclear test in May and ballistic missile tests last week.

The attacks saturated target websites with access requests generated by malicious software planted on personal computers. This overwhelmed some targeted sites and slowed server response to legitimate traffic.

The so-called "distributed denial of service" hacking attack spreads viruses on PCs, turning them into zombies to simultaneously connect to specific sites, unbeknown to owners, experts said.

U.S. officials would not speculate on who might be behind the attacks but noted that U.S. government websites face attacks or scams "millions of times" a day.

[winston]

If a part-time hacker can do this, I shudder to think what an organized state sponsor unit can do ...

Cyber attacks on SKorea came from 16 countries

South Korean president and defence ministry home pages appear to be inaccessible

Related News
• SKorea, US hit by more cyber attacks
• South Korea to set up cyber command against North Korea
• South Korean websites attacked by North Korea

SEOUL: This week's cyber attacks on South Korea are believed to have been mounted from 16 different countries but North Korea was not among them, Seoul's spy agency was quoted as saying Friday.

The National Intelligence Service (NIS) told legislators the attacks were tracked to 86 Internet protocol addresses from 16 countries including the United States, Japan, China and Guatemala, the lawmakers said.

The lawmakers, quoting information from the NIS given in a closed briefing, said North Korea was not among the 16 countries.

"The NIS suspects North Korea or its sympathisers are behind the attacks but it says it cannot be sure until the ongoing probe is completed," Park Young-Sun, a lawmaker of the opposition Democratic Party, told journalists.

The agency based its suspicion on a statement issued by Pyongyang last month warning of cyber warfare and the fact that many of the targets were websites operated by conservatives, the lawmakers said.

The North's Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea, lambasting Seoul over its plan to participate in the US-led exercise "Cyber Storm," said on June 27 that Pyongyang was "fully ready for any form of high-tech war."

Cyber Storm is a drill against cyber attacks.

A third wave of cyber attacks hit South Korea on Thursday evening, blocking or impeding access to at least seven Web sites operated by the country's largest lender Kookmin Bank, government and media organisations.

Several Seoul-based portal sites also reported that their mail services underwent temporary access disruptions.

"The volume of attacks in a third round of cyber attacks was small and the impact was rather meagre," Park Cheol-Soon, a senior official of the Korea Communications Commission (KCC), told AFP.

Many users whose computers had been hijacked for attacks had vaccine programmes downloaded on their machines, he added.

The US State Department said its website also came under attack for a fourth day Thursday. The White House and Pentagon websites were among US government entities targeted earlier this week.

Hackers have planted viruses in thousands of personal computers in South Korea and overseas.

The so-called distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack involves computers being programmed to swamp certain US and South Korean websites at selected times.

The attack used an army of malware-infected computers known as a "botnet" in a bid to paralyse US and South Korean websites by overwhelming them with traffic.

US experts were divided on whether the communist state was behind the ongoing attacks, an assault that highlighted the vulnerabilities of the Internet.

"I don't think it was North Korea, but there's really no proof either way," said Johannes Ullrich, chief technology officer for the SANS Institute's Internet Storm Center, which monitors cyber threats.

"The way this particular malware was written it looks like one guy wrote it in his basement over a weekend," he said. "But maybe that's what North Korea's cyberwarfare unit looks like."

"It could be anybody," he continued. "It could be a South Korean. It could be a Chinese, whoever had motivation and the tools to do it. There's really nothing that points to a nation state."

Joe Stewart, director of the counter-threat unit at SecureWorks, agreed, telling Computerworld "it looks like every other 'bot' (botnet) I see created by an intermediate programmer."

Around a dozen websites in the United States and another dozen in South Korea were among those targeted in the attack, which began on Sunday.

Spokesman Ian Kelly said the State Department's website, state.gov, continued to come under attack on Thursday but not in "high volume".

He said Thursday he had "no information" about any North Korean involvement.

- AFP/yt

[winston]

Wonder what is going thru his mind now? Does he want to bring a few billion peope with him or was it all brinksmanship to try to feed his people or to try to extract "something for nothing" for himself and his cronies? He does not look like an unreasonable person on TV...

North Korea's Kim has "serious" pancreas disorder, says report

TOKYO: North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il is suffering from a "serious disorder" of the pancreas, a Japanese television network reported on Friday, quoting a South Korean intelligence official.

The 67-year-old's condition has been the focus of much speculation since he reportedly suffered a stroke last August.

The TBS network reported that Kim has been resting and is being treated at his villa in the southeasten area of Wonsan by a team of specialists.

The unidentified official told TBS Kim would be aware of the disorder which was made known to US and South Korean intelligence authorities in March.

Kim is believed to have been receiving treatment since he attended the first meeting of the country's new parliament in April, the official was quoted as saying.

In that month, he was shown in video footage by state media for the first time since August. He appeared to have lost weight in the film.

On Wednesday, a gaunt-looking Kim made a rare televised appearance as he paid homage to his late father Kim Il-Sung at a national memorial service. The film showed Kim's hair was thinning and he had developed a slight limp.

- AFP/al

[millionairemind]

Maybe he's just lonely...

[winston]

North Korean leader's grandson seen at Macau gig

SEOUL - The teenage grandson of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il was among cheering fans who packed a concert in Macau by a top South Korean pop star, a newspaper report said Saturday.

The communist state has been staging a campaign to weed out "decadent" foreign culture and ideals, but defectors say South Korean pop songs and movies are nevertheless popular in the isolated country.

Chosun Ilbo newspaper said the 14-year-old boy and five South Korean friends sang along and cheered to the pop star Rain, who performed in Macau on June 27.

"We were astounded when Kim Jong-Il's grandson sang along and cheered to a South Korean entertainer," the daily quoted an unidentified South Korean living in the Chinese special administrative region.

The boy is the son of Kim Jong-Il's eldest son Jong-Nam, who according to Chosun bought six tickets for his own son and the five South Korean teenagers at a cost of some 1,400 dollars.

Jong-Nam did not attend the concert.

Chosun quoted South Korean residents in Macau as saying Jong-Nam, his wife and their son have no qualms about mingling with South Korean residents there.

However Jong-Nam has been keeping a low-profile since May when his half brother Jong-Un was nominated as successor to the leader, Chosun said.

"He left for Bangkok last week as South Korean and Japanese journalists are hanging around at his favourite restaurants and bars. He will stay in Bangkok for a while," one South Korean in Macau told the daily.

South Korea's intelligence service has confirmed that Jong-Un is the successor, according to lawmakers briefed by the service.

Jong-Nam apparently spoiled his prospects after being deported from Japan in 2001 for trying to enter the country on a forged passport. He reportedly said he wanted to visit Tokyo Disneyland.

- AFP /ls

[kennynah]

you can see that Jong-un (that boy in the topic above) is as popular as his grandfather, Kim Jong-Il, the current supreme leader of north korea... he's very promising indeed

[winston]

Korean Tech stocks are down > 2%. Why ? Profit-taking ? Or something else like slow demand for chips ?

[winston]

S Korea posts 4th-largest current account surplus ever

(Seoul) South Korea posted its fourth-largest current account surplus ever last month on a higher goods account and a smaller services account deficit, central bank data showed yesterday, lending further support to the won. Exports and imports also grew last month, adding to hopes for a recovery in Asia's fourth-largest economy.

The current account - the broadest measure of foreign trading in goods and services - rose to a seasonally adjusted surplus of US$4.67 billion last month from a revised US$2.99 billion surplus in May, the Bank of Korea said in a statement. June's figure was the biggest after seasonally adjusted surpluses of US$6.47 billion in April, US$6.64 billion in March, and US$4.74 billion in February 1998, according to the central bank.

Goods exports grew to a seasonally adjusted US$30.36 billion last month from a revised US$28.37 billion in May, helping the country post a goods account surplus of US$5.60 billion. Imports rose for a third month in a row to US$24.76 billion from a revised US$23.31 billion in
May. The country posted a seasonally adjusted surplus of US$23.4 billion for the first six months of the year, compared with a US$1.6 billion deficit a year earlier. Earlier this month, the Bank of Korea revised up its current account surplus forecast for the full year to US$29 billion from US$18 billion.

Before seasonal adjustments, South Korea posted a current account surplus of US$5.43 billion last month, compared with a revised US$3.50 billion surplus in May, the Bank of Korea said.

Source: Business Times, AFP, Reuters and Bloomberg

[winston]

While millions suffer from famine and poverty ...

North Korea Says Plutonium From Fuel Rods Being Weaponized By Seonjin Cha

Sept. 4 (Bloomberg) -- North Korea said it’s entered the final stage of uranium enrichment and is weaponizing plutonium extracted from spent fuel rods, the country’s official Korea Central News Agency said today.