Border security supplies new phone detectors… ‘3 minutes, 5 meters’
The border at Hoeryong City, North Hamgyong Province. (Image: NK Times)
North Korean security authorities have reportedly replaced and supplied new portable radio wave detectors to officers stationed along the border region with China.
The move is interpreted as an effort to strengthen border security by thoroughly blocking the inflow and outflow of information through Chinese mobile phones.
According to an NK Times source in North Hamgyong Province, new portable radio wave detectors were distributed last month to officers in the Border Region State Security Department in Hoeryong City, Musan County, and other districts.
Training on how to use the new devices was conducted from March 10 to 13, and distribution to officers of the Border Region State Security Department took place from March 15 to 25.
The technology upgrade is part of an effort to identify users of Chinese mobile phones.
The old devices, supplied in October 2022, were able to detect the location of a call within a 30-meter radius in under five minutes.
But the new detectors can reportedly locate signals from Chinese mobile phones more quickly and accurately. The detection range has been narrowed to just five meters within three minutes, allowing for much faster apprehension of suspects.
Alerted to the change, residents using Chinese mobile phones have reportedly been shortening their calls from five to two minutes.
“Before the new devices were supplied, people would make calls deep in the mountains or in areas where detection could be avoided, but now even that has become difficult,” the source said. “As news spreads about the improved capabilities of the newly distributed detectors, people using Chinese mobile phones are drastically reducing their external communications.”
“Since the pandemic, many people caught by the detectors have been sent to political prison camps,” he said.
“Until the actual performance of the new devices is fully confirmed, residents using Chinese mobile phones are likely to refrain from external contact,” he said.
Kang is a reporter at NK Times, a Seoul-based media outlet focused on North Korean issues. He was born in 1978 in Chongjin and graduated from Chongjin 1st High School in North Korea. After 10 years of military service in the 4th Army Corps, he attended Chongjin Agricultural University before defecting.
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