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Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

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Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#21

Post by DicIfTEx »

echoangle wrote: post #2

From the linked 38north.org article: > An older version of the app, version 1.1, was previously detailed by Alek Sigley, an Australian student who previously lived in Pyongyang while studying at Kim Il Sung University. How does that work? Do they just let foreigners into their University? And does this get accepted in any western state? Also, good luck ever working for a defense company or anything sensitive after th…

> How does that work? Do they just let foreigners into their University?

Yep, looks that way: http://www.ryongnamsan.edu.kp/univ/en/education/internationa... (although I note that 'the US' is not included in the list of past students' nationalities).

There is also a private university in Pyongyang funded by foreign Evangelicals, including from the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyongyang_University_of_Scienc...

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#22

Post by johannes1234321 »

mrtksn wrote: post #13
echoangle wrote: post #2

From the linked 38north.org article: > An older version of the app, version 1.1, was previously detailed by Alek Sigley, an Australian student who previously lived in Pyongyang while studying at Kim Il Sung University. How does that work? Do they just let foreigners into their University? And does this get accepted in any western state? Also, good luck ever working for a defense company or anything sensitive after th…

On my vacation in Cuba some years ago, I found out that there are quite many westerners going there to learns Spanish in Cuban educational institutions. There were also university students who were there to participate in vocational education in Cuba-specific product manufacturing like rum. AFAIK even in Soviet times there were friendship programs and partnerships with the West to build civil ties which facilitated s…

The situation with North Korea is a lot different. North Korea is blocking itself quite up and very restrictive who can enter the country and what they can do.

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#23

Post by RobotToaster »

mrtksn wrote: post #13
echoangle wrote: post #2

From the linked 38north.org article: > An older version of the app, version 1.1, was previously detailed by Alek Sigley, an Australian student who previously lived in Pyongyang while studying at Kim Il Sung University. How does that work? Do they just let foreigners into their University? And does this get accepted in any western state? Also, good luck ever working for a defense company or anything sensitive after th…

On my vacation in Cuba some years ago, I found out that there are quite many westerners going there to learns Spanish in Cuban educational institutions. There were also university students who were there to participate in vocational education in Cuba-specific product manufacturing like rum. AFAIK even in Soviet times there were friendship programs and partnerships with the West to build civil ties which facilitated s…

> AFAIK even in Soviet times there were friendship programs

There's the Korean friendship association https://korea-dpr.com/

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#24

Post by superducktoes »

yorwba wrote: post #15

> Options to share via Bluetooth and 3G and a third unknown option that lets you enter an address That option is labeled 통보문 (tongbomun), North Korean for "text message," and the second screen asks for the address and phone number, presumably of the contact to send a text message to. That's likely why the app has the ic_launcher_smsmms.png icon.

thanks! google translate was failing me when I was looking at it.

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#25

Post by jccalhoun »

echoangle wrote: post #2

From the linked 38north.org article: > An older version of the app, version 1.1, was previously detailed by Alek Sigley, an Australian student who previously lived in Pyongyang while studying at Kim Il Sung University. How does that work? Do they just let foreigners into their University? And does this get accepted in any western state? Also, good luck ever working for a defense company or anything sensitive after th…

This BBC article says it took a couple years for him to get in: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-48782235 It sounds to me like he is one of those people who just fell in love with the idea of this isolated country and then found out the truth the hard way.

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#26

Post by yorwba »

superducktoes wrote: post #24
yorwba wrote: post #15

> Options to share via Bluetooth and 3G and a third unknown option that lets you enter an address That option is labeled 통보문 (tongbomun), North Korean for "text message," and the second screen asks for the address and phone number, presumably of the contact to send a text message to. That's likely why the app has the ic_launcher_smsmms.png icon.

thanks! google translate was failing me when I was looking at it.

Next time you might have more luck with a Korean-English dictionary extracted from a reverse-engineered North Korean dictionary app: https://digitalnk.com/blog/2020/05/08/porting-north-korean-d... (Recursion!)

... although in the case of 통보문 there are no exact matches. It appears in KEEK.db in the definitions of various English entries related to messaging, and in biyak.db as a component of messaging-related terms.

So you would need to query with something like

  SELECT * FROM dictionary WHERE word LIKE '%통보문%' OR definition LIKE '%통보문%';
for maximum recall.

(Aside: I came across that blog post while looking for a Korean dictionary I could just download and use offline; for better or worse, North Korea seems big on offline-first applications. I ended up repackaging it as an HTML file I can use easily on my phone: https://github.com/Yorwba/dic.html )

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#27

Post by malermeister »

mrtksn wrote: post #13
echoangle wrote: post #2

From the linked 38north.org article: > An older version of the app, version 1.1, was previously detailed by Alek Sigley, an Australian student who previously lived in Pyongyang while studying at Kim Il Sung University. How does that work? Do they just let foreigners into their University? And does this get accepted in any western state? Also, good luck ever working for a defense company or anything sensitive after th…

On my vacation in Cuba some years ago, I found out that there are quite many westerners going there to learns Spanish in Cuban educational institutions. There were also university students who were there to participate in vocational education in Cuba-specific product manufacturing like rum. AFAIK even in Soviet times there were friendship programs and partnerships with the West to build civil ties which facilitated s…

Cuba also has the largest medical school in the world, specifically set up to train foreigners: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_American_School_of_Medic...

It's tuition-free and the state provides room and board. Part of the admission criteria is that you have to be from an underprivileged community and you take an oath to go back to serve that community.

They have accepted folks from poor parts of the US, as well.

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#28

Post by mannyv »

echoangle wrote: post #2

From the linked 38north.org article: > An older version of the app, version 1.1, was previously detailed by Alek Sigley, an Australian student who previously lived in Pyongyang while studying at Kim Il Sung University. How does that work? Do they just let foreigners into their University? And does this get accepted in any western state? Also, good luck ever working for a defense company or anything sensitive after th…

Going to college in NK will definitely get you noticed. And the info you get from living there means you can be an instapundit expert on North Korea.

"Well Jim, I lived there for 4 years. Let me tell you how North Koreans think.'

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#29

Post by N19PEDL2 »

echoangle wrote: post #14
wruza wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And does this get accepted in any western state? What do you mean “accepted”? Is it illegal to learn in a country even if it’s a dictatorship? Last two Kims and The Sister got education in Europe, btw. New kids will do so too and then will return to reign.

Sorry for the unclear question, I wasn’t sure how to phrase that and didn’t look it up to confirm. I meant „can you transfer any credits to a western university“.

I suppose that credits earned at a North Korean university are not accepted by any other university. However, having lived in North Korea and having an insider's view of the country certainly has its advantages.

Re: Inspecting North Korea's Digital Map App: Licensing and API Insights

#30

Post by malux85 »

superducktoes wrote: post #11

guy who wrote the blog here. happy to answer any questions

Instead of trying to decode the password from the huge decompiled file, can you use a debugger to intercept the call to sqliteopen? Or shim it out?

I’m not familiar with Android development enough to know this is possible but this is what I’d do in x86 world - so just thought I’d offer a suggestion

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