South Korea Banks and Broadcasters Hit by Possible Cyberattack

Two television stations KBS and MBC, whose computers were affected, broadcast normally but said that hundreds of their computers were frozen. The cable channel YTN reported a similar problem.

Shinhan Bank reported that its Internet banking servers had been blocked temporarily. Technicians were able to restore operations, the government’s Financial Services Commission said in a statement.

Two other banks, NongHyup and Jeju, reported that operations at some of their branches were paralyzed after computers were “affected with virus and their files erased,” the commission said. A fourth bank, Woori, reported a hacking attack but suffered no damage.

The government, the military and the countries’ nuclear power plants reported no disruptions. But they said they were putting their computer technicians on a higher alert against possible hacking attempts, following North Korea’s threat of unspecified “counteractions” against South Korea for supporting a tightening of United Nations sanctions against the North following its recent nuclear test.

The police did not immediately establish a link between the simultaneous shutdowns on Wednesday and North Korea. But the incidents came five days after North Korea blamed South Korea and the United States for cyberattacks that temporarily shut down Web sites in Pyongyang last week.

North Korea suspected the allies of hacking its Web sites as part of the joint military exercises they have been conducting since early this month. North Korea “will never remain a passive onlooker to the enemies’ cyberattacks that have reached a very grave phase as part of their moves to stifle it,” the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said Friday.

Tensions remain high after North Korea recently issued a torrent of threats, including warnings of a ‘‘pre-emptive nuclear attack’’ at the United States and South Korea, as retaliation against the joint military drills and new U.N. sanctions imposed because of the North’s Feb. 12 nuclear test.

North Korea keeps an army of hackers trained to disrupt South Korea, where government operations and daily life depend greatly on its broadband Internet, South Korean officials said. North Korean hackers have been blamed for crashing the Web sites of government agencies and businesses in recent years, including a server at a state-run bank. Last May, South Korea accused the North of jamming signals, forcing hundreds of commercial flights to switch off their global positioning systems.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/21/world/asia/south-korea-computer-network-crashes.html?partner=rss&emc=rss