US hacker brings down North Korea's internet after latter's attack on security researchers

North Korea observed that the country was experiencing major connectivity issues over the last two weeks. Some observers noted that North Korea had recently conducted a series of missile tests, hinting that a foreign government's hackers may have launched a cyberattack on the country to persuade it to stop rattling its nuclear weapons. However, US Cyber Command or any other state-sponsored hacking agency bears no blame for North Korea's persistent internet failures. As per the reports of Wired, it was, however, the work of a single American man, who goes by the handle P4x.

From the booking site for its Air Koryo airline to the official web portal of the North Korean government Naenara, nearly all of its websites intermittently went offline on multiple days, according to Wired. At one point, at least one of the primary routers that allow access to the country's networks appeared to be down, thereby disabling the country’s digital ties to the outside world.

State-sponsored hackers targeted him personally says hacker P4x

Over the previous two weeks, P4x has been able to bring North Korea's internet down, making it practically impossible to connect to the outside world, according to Futurism. State-sponsored hackers targeted him personally, as did the US government's lack of public response.

He stated that it felt correct in this situation and that it will just keep coming if North Korea doesn't know they have fangs, according to Wired. He further said that he wants them to understand that if they come to the US, their internet will be down for a while. P4x claims to have discovered a slew of known but unpatched vulnerabilities in North Korean systems, allowing him to launch denial-of-service attacks against the country's few internet-connected networks.

North Korean systems highly automated says US hacker

P4x also stated that his attacks on North Korean systems are highly automated, with scripts periodically enumerating which systems are still up and running before unleashing exploits to bring them down. Most of North Korea's internet-based services were taken down as a result of the hacker's efforts, but it's unclear what was the situation in North Korea, given that most North Koreans don't have online access.

(Image: AP/Pixabay)