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Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

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Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#31

Post by foota »

liversage wrote: post #11

My understanding is that there are three mobile networks in North Korea: the normal one used by the citizens (they have smartphones made specifically for North Korea), one used by the government/military and one for tourists (requires a local SIM card only available in a specific hotel in Pyongyang). The last one is connected to the internet and this is why you can see (or at least before the pandemic could see) Inst…

Re: "I'm always surprised how they supposedly also manage to be some of the most cunning and evil actors when it comes to hacking."

I sort of suspect this is just the result of a nation state that is willing to be a pariah. That is, I think nearly any large state could do it if they didn't mind burning bridges.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#32

Post by dboreham »

I found the railroad part of the article unpersuasive. Optical repeater stations are fairly large and therefore wouldn't show up as random small underground vaults or little boxes on poles. These look like a collection of pictures of train tracks with no particular indicators of optical cables therein.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#33

Post by louthy »

foota wrote: post #31
liversage wrote: post #11

My understanding is that there are three mobile networks in North Korea: the normal one used by the citizens (they have smartphones made specifically for North Korea), one used by the government/military and one for tourists (requires a local SIM card only available in a specific hotel in Pyongyang). The last one is connected to the internet and this is why you can see (or at least before the pandemic could see) Inst…

Re: "I'm always surprised how they supposedly also manage to be some of the most cunning and evil actors when it comes to hacking." I sort of suspect this is just the result of a nation state that is willing to be a pariah. That is, I think nearly any large state could do it if they didn't mind burning bridges.

It’s not just that they don’t care about being a pariah state, it’s a literal fund raising exercise, unlike most other state sanctioned hacking.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#34

Post by toast0 »

lukan wrote: post #18
monerozcash wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DPRK can certainly get however many IP addresses they want, DPRK just doesn't have that much infrastructure that they want externally accessible. As far as I know, end-user traffic from within North Korea usually does not originate from those few IP addresses. Or at least not visibly so, they might be connecting to a proxy from a DPRK IP address.

"DPRK can certainly get however many IP addresses they want" IP4 is quite limited as far as I know and not given out freely since a long time, or what do you mean here?

APNIC has some addresses [1] and will assign up to two /24s to qualified new accounts within the region. There are also carve outs for National Internet Registries and Internet eXchange Points.

[1] as of Nov 2025, approximately 3 million or a little more than 12,000 /24s https://www.apnic.net/manage-ip/ipv4-exhaustion/#how-to-tras...

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#35

Post by samus »

codedokode wrote: post #30

Isn't it easier to hang optic cable on the poles? It seems that burying the cable requires more work. As for utility boxes along the track, it could be something railway-related, for example, some railway control or monitoring equipment.

They are too vulnerable to the elements there.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#36

Post by JumpCrisscross »

nephihaha wrote: post #20
lawlessone wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Roman Empire built lots of roads wherever they went and the British Empire built lots of rail networks.

The Roman Empire merely improved roads in many places. Gaul already had a road system, and the Greek and Egyptian spheres did too.

> Roman Empire merely improved roads in many places

/s? This is literally a Monty Python sketch.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#37

Post by actionfromafar »

codedokode wrote: post #30

Isn't it easier to hang optic cable on the poles? It seems that burying the cable requires more work. As for utility boxes along the track, it could be something railway-related, for example, some railway control or monitoring equipment.

A few inches of dirt protects against cables darkening from nuclear blasts, if you care about that sort of thing.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#38

Post by tehjoker »

bigfishrunning wrote: post #24
lawlessone wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Roman Empire built lots of roads wherever they went and the British Empire built lots of rail networks.

What I'm saying is this: there's nothing stopping you from using communication methods that aren't controlled by Americans. All of the protocols that the internet uses are documented.

This is exactly what China and North Korea do shrug but they get a lot of criticism for it.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#39

Post by petcat »

Can we back up and just recognize how insane North Korea is? I think that future generations will look back on our history and wonder why nobody ever did anything about the incredible atrocities that took place in that country for decades.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#40

Post by VWWHFSfQ »

petcat wrote: post #39

Can we back up and just recognize how insane North Korea is? I think that future generations will look back on our history and wonder why nobody ever did anything about the incredible atrocities that took place in that country for decades .

It will definitely go down as one of the biggest failures of mankind. Especially since it was so easily preventable if MacArthur was permitted to just take the whole peninsula.
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