Experts: Wouldn't take a government to bring down North Korea's Internet


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LONDON (AP) — North Korea's Internet service -- what there is of it -- has suffered at least seven outages in the last 48 hours, according to one monitor of Web traffic.

Some are talking about the possibility of a retaliatory cyber-attack by the United States, which holds the North responsible for the hacking attack on Sony Pictures.

But security experts say even amateurs -- or a simple glitch -- could have brought down North Korea's Internet service.

One security researcher in California says you'd find more Internet Protocol addresses on a large city block in New York or London than you would in all of North Korea. Ofer Gayer says "any kid" who knows how to run a small amplification attack "can do it from his home."

Security expert Bruce Schneider says in a blog post that the attack against Sony and the shutdown in North Korea shows how "technology is equalizing capability." He says, "We can't tell the difference between a couple of hackers and a government."

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