REPUBLIC OF DEBT FREE NATIONS AND PEOPLE OF THE REAL WORLD.: May 2017

North Korea tests another missile; Seoul says dashes hopes for

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un waves to North Korean scientists and technicians, who developed missile 'Hwasong-12' in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) May 20, 2017. KCNA/via REUTERS
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THERE IS ONLY ONE DEADLY ENEMY TO ALL MANKIND AND THAT IS DEEP STATE ACT OF 1871 AND SUBSEQUENT FEDERAL RESERVE'S PAPER ZERO VALUE PONZI DOLLAR.

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Why the Hwasong-12 test is such an important step forward for North Korea

In an unprecedented move, the DPRK made a successful flight of the missile just a month after unveiling it

03:24 19 May, 2017 Posted: Tal Inbar CATEGORY: ANALYSIS
The new missile in North Korea’s arsenal, the Hwasong-12, made its first public appearance on the “Day of the Sun”, the April 15 military parade at Kim Il Sung square in Pyongyang. Many theories were expounded on this missile: some thought it was another “fake” missile, others saw a new multistage rocket. Photographic analysis proved

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FQJ-fg0Rxw

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By Ju-min Park | SEOUL
North Korea fired a ballistic missile into waters off its east coast on Sunday, its second missile test in a week, which South Korea said dashed the hopes of the South's new liberal government for peace between the neighbors.

A South Korean military official said the missile appeared to be an upgraded, extended-range version of the North's solid-fuel submarine-launched missile. The missile fired a week ago flew was liquid-fueled, and flew further.

North Korea has defied all calls to rein in its nuclear and missile programs, even from China, its lone major ally, saying the weapons are needed for legitimate self-defense.

The reclusive state has been working to develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of striking the U.S. mainland. On Saturday, it said it had developed the capability to strike the U.S. mainland, although Western missile experts say the claim is exaggerated.

An official traveling with U.S. President Donald Trump in Saudi Arabia said the White House was aware of the latest launch and noted that the missile had a shorter range than the three previous missiles that North Korea had tested.

The two missile tests in a week complicate plans by South Korea's new President Moon Jae-in to seek ways to reduce tension on the peninsula. Moon took office eleven days ago after winning an election on a platform of a more moderate approach to the North, with which the South is still technically at war since no peace treaty was signed at the end of their 1950-1953 conflict.

South Korea's foreign ministry said the tests were "reckless and irresponsible actions throwing cold water over the hopes and desires of this new government and the international community for denuclearization and peace on the Korean peninsula".

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said the latest missile test by the reclusive North was "a snub and a challenge to international efforts for a peaceful resolution".

Abe told reporters after a meeting of Japan's National Security Council that he wanted to raise the issue of North Korean missile launches at the Group of Seven leaders' summit in Italy this month. China had no immediate comment.

- For graphic on 'North Korea missle launch' click: tinyurl.com/mu7mog6

RIVAL TEAMS

Kim Dong-yub, a military expert at Kyungnam University's Institute for Far Eastern Studies in Seoul, said the North appeared to be testing and perfecting both solid and liquid-fueled missiles, which might help explain why the pace of its tests had increased.

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"I think the team to develop liquid fuel missiles are being pitted against the solid fuel team," Kim said. "The liquid fuel team succeeded on May 14 so the solid fuel team went for another round to achieve success. That is why the speed of North Korea’s missile development is going beyond imagination."

Sunday's missile was launched at 0759 GMT from a location near Pukchang, 60 km (36 miles) northeast of the capital Pyongyang, an area where North Korea attempted to test-launch another missile last month but failed, South Korea's Office of Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement.

The missile flew about 500 km (310 miles), it said. Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said the missile landed outside Japan's exclusive economic zone and no damage to ships or airplanes was reported.

"The flight range was 500 km and South Korea and the United States are closely analyzing additional information," South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said.

On Saturday, North Korea's KCNA state news agency said in a commentary: "The U.S. mainland and the Pacific operational theater are within the strike range of the DPRK and the DPRK has all kinds of powerful means for annihilating retaliatory strike." North Korea's full name is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).

(Additional reporting by Tetsushi Kajimoto and Tim Kelly in Tokyo, Jeff Mason in Riyadh; Writing by Raju Gopalakrishnan; Editing by Stephen Coates and Peter Graff)
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TECHNOLOGY NEWS | Sun May 21, 2017 | 8:24am EDT
Exclusive: North Korea's Unit 180, the cyber warfare cell that worries the West
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FILE PHOTO: Military trucks carry soldiers through central Pyongyang before sunset April 15, 2017. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj/File Photo
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By Ju-min Park and James Pearson | SEOUL
North Korea's main spy agency has a special cell called Unit 180 that is likely to have launched some of its most daring and successful cyber attacks, according to defectors, officials and internet security experts.

North Korea has been blamed in recent years for a series of online attacks, mostly on financial networks, in the United States, South Korea and over a dozen other countries.

Cyber security researchers have also said they have found technical evidence that could link North Korea with the global WannaCry "ransomware" cyber attack that infected more than 300,000 computers in 150 countries this month. Pyongyang has called the allegation "ridiculous".

The crux of the allegations against North Korea is its connection to a hacking group called Lazarus that is linked to last year's $81 million cyber heist at the Bangladesh central bank and the 2014 attack on Sony's Hollywood studio. The U.S. government has blamed North Korea for the Sony hack and some U.S. officials have said prosecutors are building a case against Pyongyang in the Bangladesh Bank theft.

No conclusive proof has been provided and no criminal charges have yet been filed. North Korea has also denied being behind the Sony and banking attacks.

North Korea is one of the most closed countries in the world and any details of its clandestine operations are difficult to obtain. But experts who study the reclusive country and defectors who have ended up in South Korea or the West have provided some clues.

Kim Heung-kwang, a former computer science professor in North Korea who defected to the South in 2004 and still has sources inside North Korea, said Pyongyang's cyber attacks aimed at raising cash are likely organized by Unit 180, a part of the Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB), its main overseas intelligence agency.

"Unit 180 is engaged in hacking financial institutions (by) breaching and withdrawing money out of bank accounts," Kim told Reuters. He has previously said that some of his former students have joined North Korea's Strategic Cyber Command, its cyber-army.

"The hackers go overseas to find somewhere with better internet services than North Korea so as not to leave a trace," Kim added. He said it was likely they went under the cover of being employees of trading firms, overseas branches of North Korean companies, or joint ventures in China or Southeast Asia.

James Lewis, a North Korea expert at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Pyongyang first used hacking as a tool for espionage and then political harassment against South Korean and U.S. targets.

"They changed after Sony by using hacking to support criminal activities to generate hard currency for the regime," he said.

"So far, it's worked as well or better as drugs, counterfeiting, smuggling – all their usual tricks," Lewis said.

COST-EFFECTIVE, DENIABLE

The U.S. Department of Defense said in a report submitted to Congress last year that North Korea likely "views cyber as a cost-effective, asymmetric, deniable tool that it can employ with little risk from reprisal attacks, in part because its networks are largely separated from the Internet".

"It is likely to use Internet infrastructure from third-party nations," the report said.

South Korean officials say they have considerable evidence of North Korea's cyber warfare operations.

"North Korea is carrying out cyber attacks through third countries to cover up the origin of the attacks and using their information and communication technology infrastructure," Ahn Chong-ghee, South Korea's vice foreign minister, told Reuters in written comments.

Besides the Bangladesh Bank heist, he said Pyongyang was also suspected in attacks on banks in the Philippines, Vietnam and Poland.

In June last year, police said the North hacked into more than 140,000 computers at 160 South Korean companies and government agencies, planting malicious code as part of a long-term plan to lay the groundwork for a massive cyber attack on its rival.

North Korea was also suspected of staging cyber attacks against the South Korean nuclear reactor operator in 2014, although it denied any involvement.

That attack was conducted from a base in China, according to Simon Choi, a senior security researcher at Seoul-based anti-virus company Hauri Inc.

"They operate there so that regardless of what kind of project they do, they have Chinese IP addresses," said Choi, who has conducted extensive research into North Korea's hacking capabilities.

MALAYSIA LINK

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Malaysia has also been a base for North Korean cyber operations, according to Yoo Dong-ryul, a former South Korean police researcher who studied North Korean espionage techniques for 25 years.

"They work in trading or IT programming companies on the surface," Yoo told Reuters. "Some of them run websites and sell game and gambling programs".

Two IT firms in Malaysia have links to North Korea's RGB spy agency, according to a Reuters investigation this year, although there was no suggestion either of them was involved in hacking.

Michael Madden, a U.S.-based expert on the North Korean leadership, said Unit 180 was one of many elite cyber warfare groups in the North Korean intelligence community.

"The personnel are recruited from senior middle schools and receive advanced training at some elite training institutions," Madden told Reuters.

"They have a certain amount of autonomy in their missions and tasking as well," he said, adding that they could be operating from hotels in China or Eastern Europe.

In the United States, officials said there was no conclusive evidence that North Korea was behind the WannaCry ransomware, but that was no reason to be complacent.

"Whether or not they are directly involved with ransomware doesn't change the fact that they are a real cyber threat," said a senior administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Dmitri Alperovitch, co-founder of prominent U.S. security firm CrowdStrike Inc, added: "Their capabilities have improved steadily over time, and we consider them to be a threat actor that is capable of inflicting significant damage on U.S. private or government networks."

(To view a graphic on 'Don't click: The ransomware WannaCry worm' click here)

(Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in Washington, Joseph Menn in San Francisco,; Rozanna Latiff and Tom Allard in Kuala Lumpur; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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North Korea Launches Another Ballistic Missile

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by Tyler Durden
May 21, 2017 8:03 AM
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North Korea launched a ballistic missile Sunday afternoon which flew more than 500 kilometers, only one week after conducting its latest, successful ballistic missile test last Sunday, South Korea's military announced. The missile was launched at 0759 GMT from a location near Pukchang, 60 km northeast of the capital Pyongyang, an area where North Korea attempted to test-launch another missile last month but failed, South Korea's Office of Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement quoted by Yonhap.

The missile flew about 310 miles, a spokesman for Seoul’s defense ministry said, adding that authorities were analyzing the details of the test launch. Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said the missile landed outside Japan's exclusive economic zone and no damage to ships or airplanes was reported.

North Korea test-fired a new mid-to-long-range rocket, which it calls the Hwasong-12, on May 14, 2017

The launch was the 11th missile Pyongyang has fired this year according to the WSJ. North Korea last test-launched a missile from the Pukchang airfield late last month. In that case, the missile blew up minutes after launch in an apparent failed test. U.S. authorities said at the time that the missile didn’t leave North Korean territory. In contrast, Sunday’s successful test launch was further evidence of a pickup in momentum for North Korea’s missile program, coming on the heels of the testing of the country's most advanced missile yet a week earlier that surprised many North Korea missile watchers.

The latest two successful launches demonstrate the rapid progress North Korea is making as part of a drive to be able to threaten the continental U.S. with a nuclear-tipped missile.

In last Sunday's test, North Korea launched a new intermediate-range ballistic missile that it claimed was capable of carrying a large nuclear warhead. It called the missile the Hwasong-12. Independent analysts have said that, based on their calculations, the Hwasong-12 could reach the U.S. military base in Guam, more than 2,000 miles from Pyongyang. As noted previously, Victor Cha, Korea chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said after the Hwasong-12 test that the successful launch “demonstrates that we have once again underestimated North Korea’s nuclear and missile capabilities.” He said the Hwasong-12 “represents a leap in ballistic missile technology.”

Sunday’s missile test was also the second since South Korea’s new President Moon Jae-in took office this month, a further test for the country’s first liberal president in nearly a decade. Moon has called for closer ties with North Korea, primarily through economic engagement. Needless to say, he was not happy and on Sunday president Moon Jae-in convened a National Security Council meeting to discuss the provocation. "North Korea fired an unidentified ballistic missile in the eastern direction at around 4:59 p.m. from the vicinity of Pukchang in Pyeongannam-do (South Pyeongan Province)," the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said in a statement.

A spokesman for the U.S. Pacific Command said it tracked the missile until it splashed down in the waters between Korea and Japan.

An official traveling with U.S. President Donald Trump in Saudi Arabia said the White House was aware that North Korea had launched what it described as a medium-range ballistic missile and noted that the missile had a shorter range than the three previous tested by North Korea.

As the WSJ adds, just hours before Sunday’s launch, North Korea warned through its state media that it would follow up the Hwasong-12 launch with more missile tests. “Many more ‘Juche weapons’ capable of striking the U.S. will be launched from this land,” North Korea’s Minju Joson newspaper said in a commentary Sunday, according to Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency. Juche, or self-reliance, is a reference to North Korea’s state ideology. The commentary also appeared to directly rebuke Trump’s prior vows to prevent the North from further developing its nuclear and missile capabilities.

“This is the DPRK’s answer to the Trump administration,” the Minju Joson commentary added. “The U.S. has no force to check the vigorous advance of Juche Korea.”

In Tokyo, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe denounced the missile launch and called it a “challenge to the world.” Mr. Abe said he wanted to make North Korea a principal issue at the Group of Seven summit in Italy later this week. “I would like to send a clear message." China had no immediate comment.