Experts: Major web outage came from within
The North's Internet was hit by a major outage that lasted several hours, knocking off connection to government websites and official news services online and severing the reclusive country from cyberspace.
It was not clear what caused the outage but it may have been internal rather than a cyberattack, as connections via China and Russia were affected, said researchers who monitor North Korea's Internet and technology infrastructure.
North Korea's main official news services, its Foreign Ministry, and the Air Koryo national airline were among websites inaccessible yesterday, before they started coming back slowly around midday.
North Korea's entire Internet infrastructure was not showing up on systems that can monitor Internet activities, and email services were also affected, Junade Ali, a UK-based researcher who monitors the North Korean Internet, said earlier.
'Hard to say if this is intentional or accidental – but seems like this is internal rather than an attack.'
Officials at South Korea's cyberterror response centre, a police division that monitors North Korea's cyberactivities, could not be reached for comment.
Martyn Williams, who specialises in North Korea's technology and infrastructure at the Washington-based Stimson Center, also said the cause appeared to be internal as the Chinese and Russian connections were not working. — Reuters
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