South Korean lawmaker: North hacked war plans
SEOUL: North Korean computer hackers have stolen hundreds of classified military documents from South Korea, including detailed war plans involving its ally, the United States, a report said yesterday.
Mr Rhee Cheol-Hee, a lawmaker for the ruling Democratic party, said the hackers had broken into the South's military network last September and gained access to 235 gigabytes of sensitive data, the Chosun Ilbo daily reported.
Among the leaked documents was an operational plan for use in case of war with the North, including procedures for "decapitation" attacks on leader Kim Jong-Un, the paper quoted Mr Rhee as saying.
Mr Rhee, a member of parliament's defence committee, could not be reached for comment but his office said he had been quoted correctly.
The report comes amid heightened fears of conflict on the Korean peninsula, fuelled by US President Donald Trump's continued threats of military action against Pyongyang to tame its weapons ambitions.
In his latest tweet over the weekend, Mr Trump reiterated that diplomatic efforts with North Korea have consistently failed, adding that "only one thing will work".
Citing Seoul's defence ministry, Mr Rhee said that 80 per cent of the leaked documents had yet to be identified.
But the contingency plan for the South's special forces was stolen, he said, as well as details about annual joint military drills with the US and information on key military facilities and power plants.
A ministry spokesman declined to confirm the report, citing intelligence matters. In May, the ministry said North Korea had hacked into Seoul's military intranet but did not say what had been leaked.
Pyongyang has a 6,800-strong unit of trained cyber-warfare specialists, according to the South Korean government. It has been accused of launching high-profile cyber-attacks, including the 2014 hacking of Sony Pictures. - AFP
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