Posts Tagged ‘Kim Jong-Un’
Trump: I have a ‘much bigger’ button than Kim Jong Un
President Trump on Tuesday said that the nuclear launch button on his desk is “much bigger” and “more powerful” than that of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un – and that his button actually “works.”
“North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un just stated that the ‘Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times,'” Trump tweeted. “Will someone from his depleted and food starved regime please inform him that I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!”
Trump’s comments came after Kim said in a New Year’s Day speech that he had a nuclear launch button at his desk, and that the international community would have to accept North Korea’s status as a nuclear-armed nation as a “reality.”
In that address, Kim also said he was willing to send a delegation to the Winter Olympics in South Korea in February and engage in talks with Seoul about easing military tensions between the two countries.
South Korea responded to Kim’s remarks on Tuesday, calling for a dialogue between Seoul and Pyongyang aimed at de-escalating tensions ahead of the Winter Games.
Trump’s latest tweet, however, appeared to challenge Kim’s claim that North Korea has become a functional nuclear power, while delivering a warning that he stood ready to retaliate against a possible nuclear launch by Pyongyang.
The Trump administration has said little about the possibility of talks between North and South Korea, and Trump was unclear in a Tuesdaymorning tweet about whether the U.S. welcomed such a dialogue.
“Sanctions and ‘other’ pressures are beginning to have a big impact on North Korea,” Trump tweeted. “Soldiers are dangerously fleeing to South Korea. Rocket man now wants to talk to South Korea for first time. Perhaps that is good news, perhaps not – we will see!”
Note: House chief Republican said the USA has become the most lame country in the world with Trump’s mania of tweeting
State-sponsored hacking on the rise: The USA, France, Israel, China and now North Korea?
Posted by: adonis49 on: December 23, 2014
State-sponsored hacking on the rise: The USA, France, Israel, China and now North Korea
North Korea only needed an Internet connection and computers to cripple an entire company like Sony Pictures Entertainment .
North Korea targeted Sony Pictures Entertainment because the studio planned to release “The Interview,” a satirical film depicting a plot to assassinate North Korea’s Supreme Leader Kim Jong-Un.
Hackers calling themselves “Guardians of Peace” demanded that Sony stop the movie’s release, set for Christmas, or they would attack moviegoers in a 9/11-style assault.
Sony at first bowed to pressure and on Wednesday withdrew the film from theater distribution. But on Friday, criticized for giving the hackers what they wanted, the company said it hoped to distribute the comedy starring Seth Rogen and James Franco on “different platforms.”
Sony and the rise of state-sponsored hacking
North Korea has been blamed for one of the most destructive cyber-attacks on a company in US history. It’s just the latest in a string of hacks sanctioned and funded by governments
Ian Sherr and Seth Rosenblatt posted this December 20, 2014
“This is absolutely a wake-up call,” said Bruce Bennett, an expert on North Korea and military defense for the RAND Corporation think tank. “We have North Koreans who built nuclear weapons. Why should we suspect they can’t do cyberattacks?”
While the latest cyberattack puts North Korea in the public eye, the country is not unique.
China, Israel, France, Syria and the US are among the world’s most powerful countries that have amassed armies of hackers engaged in cyberwarfare. These countries have reportedly used sophisticated computer skills to disable Iran’s uranium enrichment plants, cripple oil and gas production in Saudi Arabia and sabotage satellite and infrastructure systems around the world.
The number of cyberespionage attacks across the Web rose 15 % between 2011 and 2013, according to a report by Verizon. The annual cost of a successful cyberattacks increased to $20.8 million in the financial sector, $14.5 million in technology and $12.7 in the communications industry, according to a Heritage Foundation report released just before the attack on
Most attacks targeting the US come from China and France, in addition to those originating on American soil, according to Internet research firm Norse. State-sponsored hacking is “undeniably on the rise,” said Kurt Stammberger, senior vice president of market development at Norse.
In 2010, a malicious computer program called Stuxnet successfully damaged machines Iran was believed to be using to create nuclear weapons. Two years later, The New York Times said Israel and the United States were behind the attack.
Since then, hackers working on behalf of various countries have carried out plots against nations and corporations.
The Syrian Electronic Army, a group of hackers sympathetic to the dictatorial regime there, has defaced websites and taken control of social-media accounts.
The Chinese government is suspected of having breached the computer networks of government and spy agencies around the world, as well as large corporations including Google, Adobe, Yahoo and defense contractor Northrop Grumman.
President Obama also said he doesn’t believe North Korea worked with other countries in the attack against Sony.
In the not-too-distant future, warfare with traditional weaponry may take a backseat to potentially more destructive tactics: computer code attacking the companies and infrastructures, including electric grids and oil and gas pipelines, that society relies on.
That isn’t as farfetched as it once was, said Dmitri Alperovitch, co-founder of security services firm CrowdStrike. “From a technical perspective, this attack wasn’t unprecedented,” he said. “There’s no doubt we’ll see more of these in the future.”
While the attack on Sony may seem expansive in its destructive scope, it only affected shareholders, partner companies and employees. An attack on critical infrastructure of countries would be more devastating, said Evan Sills, a cybersecurity consultant at Good Harbor.
Many countries have the ability to do such damage but have so far refrained from such destructive attacks, Sills added. But that doesn’t mean terrorist groups will show similar restraint.
“What North Korea did to Sony, a terrorist group could do to them in three years,” Sills said. “In terms of how bad could it get? It could get pretty bad.”
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