Pyongyang suspect in cyber attack on South Korea

A cyber attack has hit computer systems at television broadcasters and banks in South Korea. The TV broadcasters reported drawings of three skulls on a black background appeared on their computer screens after the attack. /Image via hdwpapers.com


A cyber attack this week on South Korean media companies and banks was likely launched from North Korea, according to several experts.

"This sort of mass scale attack is a planned organizational one, not by some hacker," Lim Jong-In, an information security professor at Korea University, told ABC News. "North Korea wants to show-off their strong arm without making human casualties. Their goal is to create instability here."

Computer networks at three South Korean television broadcasters and two banks were shut down in the cyber attack. It could take months to determine definitively whether North Korea was behind the hacking.

Last week, North Korean officials accused the United States and South Korea of attacking websites in Pyongyang.