HRF’s Flash Drives for Freedom May Be Reaching Deep Inside North Korea via Balloon-Borne Packages: Kim Yo-Jong Confirms
Kim Yo-jong (left) | Photo by the ROK’s Presidential Office.
Kim Yo-jong, the influential sister of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, inadvertently revealed some crucial details about the balloons carrying information packages sent to North Korea by Human Rights Foundation (HRF) partners, along with insights into how far these balloon payloads can travel within the country.
In November of last year, HRF’s partners in South Korea launched three major operations, sending 150 information packages—50 each time—from near the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) using large balloons. Typically, one balloon carries one package.
These packages contained leaflets exposing the ruling Kim family’s corrupt history, essential items such as packaged foods, fever and pain relievers, along with content-loaded USB sticks and SD cards supplied by HRF’s Flash Drives for Freedom. The drives were this time loaded with defectors’ memoirs, Harry Potter books, social science studies, world history, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and materials designed to inspire critical thinking and entrepreneurship among young North Koreans.
However, what our partners didn’t expect was receiving helpful insights into the balloons they sent from the least likely source. On November 17 and 26, North Korea’s state-run news outlet, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), published a statement by Kim Yo-jong on each date—a member of the Kim family, known for its iron-fisted totalitarian rule. Kim is the deputy director of the Propaganda and Agitation Department of the Workers’ Party of Korea and wields significant influence within the North Korean government due to her familial ties with her brother, Kim Jong-un.
Her statements in question came out amid rising tensions between the two Koreas over the dissemination of information critical of the regime in Pyongyang late last year.
Since May 28, the North Korean regime has responded harshly to balloon campaigns by human rights activists in South Korea who seek to deliver informational leaflets and flash drives loaded with world information to North Koreans trapped in an information black hole. The regime in Pyongyang exerts absolute control over all media in the country, relentlessly glorifying the Kim family and fabricating an illusion of prosperity. Meanwhile, it depicts life beyond its borders as nothing but misery.
In a bizarre countermeasure, from late May until the end of last year, the North Korean government launched more than 6,220 balloons filled with trash — cigarette butts, shredded clothing, and even some possible human waste — into South Korean territory, claiming the activists’ leaflets were a provocation.
After one of three balloon launches by HRF’s partners in mid-November, KCNA published Kim Yo-jong’s statement on the 17th, condemning the scattering of leaflets across various areas of North Korea and threatening the activists.
What stood out in her statement, however, was her provision of clues about where these balloon payloads landed. She also shared images showing our partners’ balloons and packages, offering the activists valuable and surprising insights into just how far their payloads could travel across North Korea.
“On November 16, various political incitement leaflets and items sent by South Korean scums entered many areas near the southern border and even deep inside the country,” read Kim’s statement. “Reports continued to come in from various locations throughout the day yesterday. Security agencies in the affected regions are blocking off these areas, conducting searches, and collecting and handling the items.” Kim ended with her usual colorful threat: “Our people’s anger at the most repulsive hybrid dogs sons of bitches has now reached the sky. The scums will pay a heavy price.”
North Korea’s insults, calling activists “scums” or “hybrid dogs sons of bitches,” should not come as a surprise. Pyongyang has a history of resorting to racist and gruesome language to express its dislikes. In the past, it called President Barack Obama “a black monkey,” South Korea’s president Park Geun-hye a “crafty prostitute,” and another South Korean president, Lee Myung-Pak, “the dirty, hairy body of a rat” and “despicable human scum,” among others.
KCNA also released several images with Kim’s statement, purportedly showing leaflet packages from South Korea. We can confirm that these images indeed depict packages sent by activists, specifically HRF’s partners, as shown below.
The top-left image was released by North Korea alongside Kim Yo-jong’s statement on Nov. 17. The images to the right and at the bottom were provided by HRF partners. The items shown in the top-left image—such as instant coffee sticks, a timer, cookies, and other products—match those identifiable in the packages prepared and sent by HRF partners.
The left slide shows additional images released by North Korea in Kim’s Nov. 17 statement. The right slide displays images provided by HRF partners, who confirmed that the items shown in the North Korean images are their packages.
Encouraged by Kim’s confirmation that their balloons reached many areas, including deep inside the country, our partners sent another batch of 50 informational packages—along with a large number of content-loaded USB drives supplied by HRF—following her November 17 statement.
On November 26, Kim in Pyongyang released another statement through KCNA, once again calling activists “South Korean scums” for sending the balloons. Like her earlier statement, Kim’s message on this date also included several images showing some of the balloons and packages our partners sent to North Korea the previous day.
A balloon landed next to the house of a North Korean resident. The image was released by North Korea through Kim Yo-jong’s Nov. 26 statement. We can confirm that the balloon was one of those sent by our partners to North Korea the previous day.
Activists are preparing balloons identical to the one shown in the image above, released by North Korea.
The slide on the left shows additional images released in Kim’s Nov. 26 statement, while the slide on the right displays images from HRF partners. Unlike Kim’s Nov. 17 statement, North Korea blurred the images this time, but the identifiable shapes and content in these images clearly match the packages sent to North Korea by our partners, as shown on the right slide.
A few days ago, I asked Ms. Kim, whose full name is withheld for security reasons and who is directly involved in these balloon operations, how it feels to receive feedback from the high-ups in Pyongyang about the whereabouts of their leaflet packages each time.
“We’re absolutely thrilled, as if we’ve been given wings. Kim’s feedback is incredibly precise — it’s worth every bit of the fight,” she said. “Our team gets a real buzz every time we see North Korea sending us pictures of balloons, over and over again!”
Of course, there’s no guarantee that the North Korean regime will continue to drop these tantalizing hints about how far and wide the balloons are scattered across the country, or reveal related images. Another emerging concern among Korean activists is how the ongoing political uncertainty in South Korea, following President Yoon Suk Yeol’s short-lived martial law and subsequent impeachment, might impact their balloon campaigns in the new year.
Nonetheless, Kim Yo-jong’s statements confirmed our previous assessment: the information packages sent to North Korea via large balloons are reaching many regions, including deep inside the country—when done properly.
Over the last two years, from 2023 to the end of 2024, activists in South Korea, supported by HRF’s Flash Drives for Freedom, sent about 1,000 balloons carrying information packages to North Korea.
Flash Drives for Freedom (FDFF), launched by the Human Rights Foundation in 2016, aims to counter the North Korean regime’s propaganda and uphold North Koreans’ right to know. The initiative collects USB drives and SD cards to help activists share vital information with North Koreans.
Want to learn more or donate? Visit the program website to get involved!
Seongmin is the director of the Korea Desk at the Human Rights Foundation.
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