River_Rat_459
08-05-2011, 20:15
Kim Jong-il. The great leader indeed....
A group of gold farmers are reportedly sending money to the North Korean government.
By Chris Pereira (http://www.1up.com/do/my1Up?publicUserId=5756002), 08/05/2011
North Korea and its leader, Kim Jong-il, aren't exactly overflowing with money. As such, he does whatever he can to bring in money to continue the country's nuclear weapons program, among other things, going so far as selling weapons and drugs, counterfeiting, and so on. It's the latest of these attempts to make money, though, that is the most interesting of the bunch.
Police in the capital of South Korea, Seoul, revealed today that a group of hackers have worked to breach online games like Lineage (http://www.1up.com/games/pc/lineage-blood-pledge) and Dungeon and Fighter (a F2P MMO published by Samsung) in an effort to allow unmanned computers to play them around the clock. The goal, the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/05/world/asia/05korea.html) reports (via IGN (http://pc.ign.com/articles/118/1186437p1.html)), is to generate in-game currency and/or items which are then sold online. In under two years, the scam is said to have brought in $6 million, a portion of which is sent back to those in the North Korean capital city of Pyongyang.
North Korea has reportedly trained an "army" of hackers and programmers, some of which were being tapped to create a "squad of 30 young video gaming experts." The hackers had to forward at least $500 to the Pyongyang government every month.
"They regularly contacted North Korean agents for close consultations," Chung Kil-hwan, a member of the police agency's International Crime Investigation Unit, said of several individuals who have been arrested. He claims the hackers, who are graduates of what are described by the Times as North Korea's "elite science universities," come from Pyongyang's Korea Computer Center and the Korea Neungnado General Trading Company. The latter "reports to a shadowy Communist Party agency," Office 39, which is responsible for the aforementioned drug trafficking, counterfeiting, and other illegal moneymaking activities.
There has been no statement out of North Korea as of yet, though it has denied South Korea's allegations of attacking South Korean computer networks in the past.
SOURCE: http://www.1up.com/news/kim-jong-il-team-mmo-hackers-sending-money
A group of gold farmers are reportedly sending money to the North Korean government.
By Chris Pereira (http://www.1up.com/do/my1Up?publicUserId=5756002), 08/05/2011
North Korea and its leader, Kim Jong-il, aren't exactly overflowing with money. As such, he does whatever he can to bring in money to continue the country's nuclear weapons program, among other things, going so far as selling weapons and drugs, counterfeiting, and so on. It's the latest of these attempts to make money, though, that is the most interesting of the bunch.
Police in the capital of South Korea, Seoul, revealed today that a group of hackers have worked to breach online games like Lineage (http://www.1up.com/games/pc/lineage-blood-pledge) and Dungeon and Fighter (a F2P MMO published by Samsung) in an effort to allow unmanned computers to play them around the clock. The goal, the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/05/world/asia/05korea.html) reports (via IGN (http://pc.ign.com/articles/118/1186437p1.html)), is to generate in-game currency and/or items which are then sold online. In under two years, the scam is said to have brought in $6 million, a portion of which is sent back to those in the North Korean capital city of Pyongyang.
North Korea has reportedly trained an "army" of hackers and programmers, some of which were being tapped to create a "squad of 30 young video gaming experts." The hackers had to forward at least $500 to the Pyongyang government every month.
"They regularly contacted North Korean agents for close consultations," Chung Kil-hwan, a member of the police agency's International Crime Investigation Unit, said of several individuals who have been arrested. He claims the hackers, who are graduates of what are described by the Times as North Korea's "elite science universities," come from Pyongyang's Korea Computer Center and the Korea Neungnado General Trading Company. The latter "reports to a shadowy Communist Party agency," Office 39, which is responsible for the aforementioned drug trafficking, counterfeiting, and other illegal moneymaking activities.
There has been no statement out of North Korea as of yet, though it has denied South Korea's allegations of attacking South Korean computer networks in the past.
SOURCE: http://www.1up.com/news/kim-jong-il-team-mmo-hackers-sending-money