Army of North Korean Hackers Target Online Gaming

August 7, 2011 LHStaff General 0

It seems North Korea’s economy and leader, Kim Jong-il, are getting desperate to raise some seriously needed cash and are now targeting MMO games as a source of funding. The New York Times recently reported that North Korea is training an army of hackers to create and use software that can basically “allows round-the-clock play by “factories” of dozens of unmanned computers“. Some of the titles targeted were Lineage and Dungeon and Fighter, which is Dungeon Fighter Online in the west.

The items and in-game currency was then exchanged for cash via third-party MMO black market sites that deal with real-money-transactions. The software itself is also sold to other hackers as another revenue source.

One such group made over $6 million in a two year time span and was able to keep 55% of it, which is quite surprising that the government let them keep that much.

So next time you see some bot gold farming, it could be a North Korean hacker agent working for the government, so make sure to report them. This is war people!

5 Comments

  2. (…)
    “to create and use software that can basically “allows round-the-clock play by “factories” of dozens of unmanned computers“.”

    (…)
    “So next time you see some bot gold farming, it could be a North Korean hacker agent working for the government, so make sure to report them. This is war people!”

    No North Korean hacker, just a unmanned computer…

    But if nobody would buy the stuff they farm, it would be a better world…no damand, no market.

    *sighs silently and vanishes into the dark world wide web*

  3. why posted a image of CPLA soldiers while taking about North Korean hackers?! U guys have problem to identify Korean and Chinese?! i hope this is a mistake, not intentionally.

  4. @Ryan, probably because it would be impossible to get a similar photo of N. Korean soldiers at computers; also, you’re right, most people outside of China probably can’t tell the difference between Chinese military and N. Korean military.

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