North Korea is buying Chinese surveillance cameras in a bid to tighten controls, reports say

North Korea is buying Chinese surveillance cameras in a bid to tighten controls, reports say

North Korea is placing surveillance cameras in schools and workplaces and collecting fingerprints, photographs and other biometric information from its citizens in a technology-driven effort to more closely monitor its population, a report said Tuesday.

The country’s growing use of digital surveillance tools, which combine equipment imported from China with domestically developed software, threatens to erase many of the small spaces left by North Koreans to engage in private business activities, access foreign media and covertly criticize the government. them, the researchers wrote.

But the remote country’s digital ambitions have to contend with poor electricity supply and poor network connectivity. Those challenges, and a history of reliance on human methods of spying on its citizens, mean that digital surveillance is not yet as widespread as in China, according to the report, published by the North Korea-focused website 38 North.

The study’s findings align with the widely held view that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is stepping up efforts to tighten state control over his people and encourage loyalty to his regime.