Internet restrictions in North Korea slowly easing

Uzbekistan News.Net
Saturday 28th November, 2009

Internet access in North Korea has long been severely restricted, at least on an official basis.

There are signs however that the government-imposed freeze is starting to thaw.

Government departments and leading officials have had access for some years and use the Internet for research purposes.

The country’s leader Kim Jong-Il is an avid Internet user and one one occasion when a visiting diplomat suggested he telephone when neded, asked for the diplomat's email address.

A major breakthrough came in December last year when Internet access was made publicly available through cell phones, although on a restricted basis.

International hotels have had Internet access for some years while there are Internet cafes in the capital Pyongyang and other cities open for public use. They charge the equivalent of 6 euros an hour. To get on the network, the cafe owners need to obtain permission from the official Korean Computer Center (KCC) which controls all online information and is the service provider.

North Korea Times, which is established in Sydney, Australia, is one of a small number of English-speaking news portals for the country, however access to it locally is limited due to the restrictions. "It is unlikely we have any meaningful readership in the country," a spokesman told us. "Our main focus is to provide news on North Korea for Internet users at large, not necessarily those in the country."

According to Reporters without Borders, the North Korean Internet, which operates like an Intranet, has been available since 2000 and can provide email, a censored search engine, a browser and a few news sites that have been carefully selected by the government.

"The only available Web pages have been approved by the authorities and come from the data banks of the Democratic People’s Republic’s three biggest libraries (The Grand People’sStudy House and the Kim Il sung and Kim Chaek universities)," a report by the association said. "The information available is usually connected with science and is only accessible to a few handpicked people like academics and bureaucrats."

North Koreans however have not been left completely in the dark. A black market in cell phones from China has been thriving int the country. Buyers picking up the phones are regularly going online through ISPs in China.

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