Live data from Hacker News

Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

nkinternet.com

61–70 of 134 posts

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#61
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably helps that the stance is likely "Hack this target or your family dies". That's always pretty uhhhh motivational.

Maybe they hire international talent.

Hire is not always the correct word. There is evidence they acquire international talent without consent.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#62

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.

If you hang your fibre optic cable from poles, you will inevitably evolve flying backhoes.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#63
post #57
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, just half a dozen comments from why we're not saving North Koreans to "we could've nuked China and solved a lot of problems." Some Hacker News threads are on their own level.

Well we know what happened to North Korea after China "won". And it's pretty fucking god-awful for 10s of millions of people for 80+ years. USA dropping nukes probably would have been the better outcome for humanity.

USA dropping nukes would have prevented the convention against using nukes in wars from being started. I think there's a pretty good chance we wouldn't have any civilization left by now if we went down that fork in history.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Roman Empire merely improved roads in many places /s? This is literally a Monty Python sketch.

Like most Python material that ceased to be funny decades ago thanks to people quoting it endlessly... The Romans were true imperialists. They considered their opponents to be barbarians, and claimed they lived in wastelands. The truth is more complex. In many places — yes, including Judaea — they inherited infrastructure and buildings. Judaea was previously occupied by the Greeks and a number of other civilisations…

> Romans were true imperialists. They considered their opponents to be barbarians

The Romans also aggressively appropriated from and integrated the people they conquered, extending the concept of citizenship and thus what it meant to be Roman in the process.

Nobody is saying the Romans came across terra nullis. But describing their engineering and culture as "merely improving roads" is silly.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#66
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China was already sending troops and material to the front lines when MacArthur was ordered to stand down. Pushing further would have meant a hot war with China.

A hot war with China in 1950 was going to end quickly with the firepower USA had on-hand.

In what way?

The US nearly lost the Korean war.

The US army was nearly overrun at least once.

The US airforce never achieved air superiority, and Soviet aircraft were better in most ways.

The only undisputed advantage the US had was nukes, which is why MacArthur wanted to use them tactically (!)

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#67
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.

You know the US destroyed nearly 75 percent of all buildings in North Korea during the Korean War, right?

NK is paranoid for very valid reasons.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Think how many tens of millions could have been saved if we had ended the Soviet Union as Churchill advocated, before the world got nukes.

You mean when Churchill wanted to hire 100,000 "former" Nazis to invade the Soviet Union?

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#69
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 .

I will get buried for saying this, but DPRK survived as a people, investing everything into a nuclear program to survive. The reason nobody did anything is they firmly built a defense against intervention, and given how the korean war went, how various US interventions looked after that, it was the correct thing to do. The most the US could do to them in recent years was murder some innocent fishermen. It has tried to starve them and failed.

Re: Hunting for North Korean Fiber Optic Cables

#70
post #55

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…

Probably helps that the stance is likely "Hack this target or your family dies". That's always pretty uhhhh motivational.

Why would they need such incentives? All they gotta do is give them a decent wage and they will be happy, which in North Korea is a paltry sum. Its not like regular North Koreans are traveling around the world, they couldn't afford it even without any other restrictions, so they have zero risk of arrest or punishment from other nations.

If I told you today that I will pay you a million dollars to go fuck around with some North Korean servers, and doing it completely anonymously with the full protection and sanction of your government, would you say no?

I think you may have some unrealistic views on how North Korea operates internally. 99% of their population lives completely normal lives and has zero extra interactions with the government beyond basic grunt military service which is common across much of the world, and paperwork for licensing, permits, and taxes. We only see the worst possible views of North Korea from the outside, slathered with thick layers of additional propaganda on top of it.

Post reply on HN