Page 106 - 121 News Today

United states, cyber warfare, cyber vandalism, whatever you want to call it. how does the u.s. fight this especially coming from north korea where to some its very surprising the capabilities theyve had here with sony. >> right. people who focus on north korea have known for years about this unit 121 as well as other cyber units that north korean military and security services have. this is the largest cyber attack from north korea. they have been linked to previous ones in the past. in the u.s....

President to consider. >> were part of the interagency discussion about the incident and about options that may be available. >> reporter: any military cyber response will be coordinated with the fbi which is leading the investigation. >> we take it very seriously. we will respond proportionally, as i said. >> reporter: one potential, an offensive, u.s. military cyber attack on north koreas limited online capabilities. but it may be tough. >> we know from defectors from this unit called bureau 1...

The south korean ship, the president promised serious consequences and basically nothing happened. a third nuclear test from north korea the president said well respond, its important the international community respond and act with resolve, but virtually nothing. north korea isnt expecting us to do anything, the world isnt expecting to us do anything. thats why its important the president does respond. >> is that it or do you go further than that? >> my question is why hasnt it been done alread...

>> let me ask you about north koreas secretive group. its called the bureau 121. apparently carries out cyber attacks overseas. what are their capabilities exactly? >> their capability from what we know, north korea has put a lot of emphasis on their missile programs, their nuclear programs, and also the asymmetrical programs and indeed cyber. i think the sense is they have good capabilities. not maybe the excellent capabilities that maybe china and russia and others have, but they have good cap...

Some it north kornorth koreans travel into china. most average north koreans never heard of the internet, certainly never had free access to it. simple reason being that north korea wants its people to remain isolated and dont want them though see things on the internet to give them a glimpse outside. the cyber unit to the bureau 121, these technical minds hand picked from pyongyang university are going to places like china, setting up shop in hotels where theres access to broadband internet, an...

Iran may indeed have helped. because they have worked together on missile development for many years, because iran has been a major client of north korea weapons. >> reporter: cnn reached out to iranian officials about that. they didnt respond. the white house maintains north korea acted alone. >> weve got no indication north korea was acting in conjunction with another country. >> reporter: north korea denies hacking sony but if pyongyang pulled this off without any outside help, it would be th...

What the united states government and other investigators believe happens is that these elite cyberattackers, part of this bureau 121 that are recruited from pyongyang universities are trained in how to launch these cyberattacks and they go to places like china where they set up in hotels and other spots that have available internet access and thats where these atechs are actually being launched from. it allows by the way, north korea to somewhat distance itself from the attacks and say these ar...

Thats really because of how sony and the movie theaters caved in. that turned it from being a simple hack into a national security and freedom of speech concern. >> professor armstrong, the south korean government says this north korean agency bureau 121 is responsible for several cyber attacks. tell us about bureau 121. >> yes. its also known as unit 121. it is part of the general bureau of reconnaissance, the int intelligence unit of the north korean security apparatus established in the 1990s...

To the cause. james, last word here. in your work with north korea, studying north korea, you have actually been in contact or seen some of these hackers on their way to china to be trained. what can you tell us about that? >> so i cant go into too much detail, but we have a source whos filming secretly just across the china border. and he saw some north korean hackers that we think were a part of this kind of cyber warfare unit called bureau 121. and, you know, its a kind of open secret that th...

Of bureau 121. the general consensus is they had to have had help from somewhere. perhaps training, perhaps where the training was from. the orders may be coming from pyongyang, but its spread around the world. it is something they are investigating. just to give you perspective on the allusiveness of bureau 121, it is an open secret. people know it exists. the government has been talking ability it. they dont know how many agents there are and how sophisticated. they are quite sophisticated. th...