North Korea Faces Widespread Internet Outage Across Official Websites
(MENAFN) Almost all North Korean websites have remained inaccessible for more than a day, cutting off external access to state media outlets and government platforms, according to reports published Wednesday.
The reason behind the extensive disruption has yet to be identified. However, the outage appears to involve North Korea’s “Ryugyong-dong” network, which has traditionally depended on internet connectivity provided by Chinese telecommunications company China Unicom through IP addresses linked to Hong Kong-based network Cenbong.
The interruptions began on Tuesday, when several major websites experienced simultaneous and prolonged outages. Those affected included the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), the Rodong Sinmun and Minju Joson newspapers, and Voice of Korea, the country's external broadcasting service.
Other unavailable platforms included Naenara, North Korea’s official information portal, the Foreign Ministry website, national carrier Air Koryo and the DPRK Portal, which maintains a directory of the country's official websites. DPRK stands for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, North Korea’s formal name.
KCNA briefly regained connectivity later on Tuesday but subsequently experienced another interruption, remaining unavailable for 19 hours out of the 24 hours following the initial disruption. Most of the other affected websites stayed offline, with only around 10 minutes of brief connectivity recorded on Wednesday morning.
The outage has also affected Pyongyang’s Silibank SMTP email server, which has been unavailable since Tuesday morning, except for a short five-minute period of access on Wednesday.
North Korea has alternative routes for accessing the global internet. Russian telecommunications operator TransTeleCom has provided a secondary connection since 2017, while Chinese and Russian services have also directed traffic through an additional network based in the Philippines since 2023 to supplement the Ryugyong-dong system.
Despite these backup arrangements, connectivity across the country has remained severely disrupted for more than 24 hours, leaving most official websites and online services inaccessible. The cause and duration of the outage remain uncertain.
The reason behind the extensive disruption has yet to be identified. However, the outage appears to involve North Korea’s “Ryugyong-dong” network, which has traditionally depended on internet connectivity provided by Chinese telecommunications company China Unicom through IP addresses linked to Hong Kong-based network Cenbong.
The interruptions began on Tuesday, when several major websites experienced simultaneous and prolonged outages. Those affected included the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), the Rodong Sinmun and Minju Joson newspapers, and Voice of Korea, the country's external broadcasting service.
Other unavailable platforms included Naenara, North Korea’s official information portal, the Foreign Ministry website, national carrier Air Koryo and the DPRK Portal, which maintains a directory of the country's official websites. DPRK stands for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, North Korea’s formal name.
KCNA briefly regained connectivity later on Tuesday but subsequently experienced another interruption, remaining unavailable for 19 hours out of the 24 hours following the initial disruption. Most of the other affected websites stayed offline, with only around 10 minutes of brief connectivity recorded on Wednesday morning.
The outage has also affected Pyongyang’s Silibank SMTP email server, which has been unavailable since Tuesday morning, except for a short five-minute period of access on Wednesday.
North Korea has alternative routes for accessing the global internet. Russian telecommunications operator TransTeleCom has provided a secondary connection since 2017, while Chinese and Russian services have also directed traffic through an additional network based in the Philippines since 2023 to supplement the Ryugyong-dong system.
Despite these backup arrangements, connectivity across the country has remained severely disrupted for more than 24 hours, leaving most official websites and online services inaccessible. The cause and duration of the outage remain uncertain.
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