In 2014, a group calling itself the Guardians of Peace – cybercriminals with known connections to North Korea – launched an attack on Sony Pictures Studio in the United States, disabling much of its network and resulting in the leak of confidential data including business plans, emails, and personal information about Sony employees (Stengel 2019). The proximate cause of the attack, as identified in a message from the hackers, was Sony’s plan to release a film called The Interview, a comedy in which two journalists become reluctant assassins and are enlisted to kill North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The North Korean government had repeatedly complained about the film prior to the attack, calling it ‘an act of terrorism and war’, threatening retaliation, and even appealing to the United Nations (UN) to stop its release (Reuters 2014; Stengel 2019).

The resulting hack was considered one of the largest cyberattacks ever launched within the United States, but it turns out it was not unique. Unknown at the time was that North Korean hackers had previously attacked Britain’s Channel 4 network, shortly before it planned to broadcast a TV drama that presented the country in an unfavourable light (Sanger et al 2017). Commenting on this latter attack, one British cybersecurity official described the surprise of discovering North Korea’s capabilities to mount cyberattacks, calling the country ‘weird and absurd and medieval and highly sophisticated’ as well as ‘isolated’ and ‘backward’. ‘People didn’t take it seriously’, he summarized (Sanger et al 2017). Such attitudes about the country and its leaders, especially current leader Kim Jong-un and his father Kim Jong-il, are apparently common, if one takes their cues from Western popular culture. During his reign and even after his death, Kim Jong-il had been lampooned on American movies and TV as insane, fat, lonely, effeminate, small, and – generally – someone to inspire mockery rather than fear. During the early years of his reign, Kim Jong-un was likewise caricatured in music videos and other media, reportedly provoking his anger (NBC News 2014).

Media portrayals and viral videos may have been a particularly useful tool for getting under the skin of North Korea’s dictators.