The development of information technology developed by humans have brought about tremendous changes in overall life in addition to specific fields and specialized technology areas. Especially, the internet has a great effect on almost every area by pr...
The development of information technology developed by humans have brought about tremendous changes in overall life in addition to specific fields and specialized technology areas. Especially, the internet has a great effect on almost every area by providing new communication methods and space. Due to the development of information technology, the range of the national defense field is also expanded into politics, economy and culture rather than staying in the conventional military power of the past. The concept of the existing battleground was also changed into new war paradigm including cyber space. Most advanced countries pursue network-centric warfare, and various weapon systems including command and control system constitute a cyber space. This system exerts its own ability in cyber space.
Due to the development of internet with these characteristics and the change of military, North Korea is aggressively using the internet as a tool to propagate socialist ideology and system. Since 1990s, when the internet became prevalent, North Korea has used internet sites to propagate its system and ideology aggressively developing propaganda. Therefore, it is necessary to find effective countermeasures by analyzing North Korea's propaganda activities in cyber space and the characteristics of cyber space.
The situation is changed into psychological warfare in cyber space, which is recognized as a new battlefield due to the development of information technology, also known as cyber psychological warfare. The cyber psychological warfare refers to the planned use of propaganda and all other activities in cyber space that affect other countries and political groups' opinions, emotion, attitudes and behaviors for effective accomplishment of the nation's policy. This cyber psychological warfare can be developed with low cost without restriction of locations by a small number of skilled individuals or groups. It also can inflict confusion and damages as deadly as nuclear weapon with elementary level of skills. Besides, it can be applied beyond time and space, and it has anonymity, the feature of cyber space, so countries that are in poor economic situation like North Korea can utilize it as a very effective new weapon.
Therefore, to block the increasing North Korea's cyber psychological warfare and to contribute to the victory of war, our military needs a great transition of thinking in the essence and characteristics of cyber psychological warfare, and response organization and performance system of national defense level should be completed. Based on this, the ability and threat of North Korea's cyber psychological warfare should be analyzed, and cyber psychological strategy development direction as the method of military attacks should be prepared, so absolute superiority in psychological warfare can be established. For this, specialized manpower should be fostered, and information technology that guarantees psychological warfare should be developed.