Cyber War erupts - North Korea knocked offline by possible American cyber attack

North Korea is offline today, and it could be the result of a retaliatory attack by the United States. Although neither side is acknowledging anything at the moment, it is speculated that a full-scale cyber war between the two countries could be starting.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - A very dangerous situation is developing between the USA and North Korea. A complete internet outage has been reported in North Korea. Such a widespread outage could be the start of a much larger conflict between the United States and North Korea and could be a retaliation of North Korea's alleged hack into American networks.

Last week, it was reported that hackers connected to the North Korean government hacked into Sony Pictures and their corporate network, as a preemptive strike against the release of a movie that depicts the assassination of Kim Jong Un, the North Korean dictator.

Let us pray for peace as this situation develops. May justice and peace prevail.

North Korea has officially denied the rumors. President Obama vowed the U.S. would respond against North Korea.

North Korea has four internet networks that serve its online needs, and all of them run through China. Yesterday, intermittent outages were reported and today, the entire nation is offline.

It is possible that the entire scheme is a plot of the USA to serve as a pretext for conflict with North Korea. Or, alternatively, North Korea could be guilty and today we are witnessing the prelude to the next global conflict.

World War III is typically depicted with mushroom clouds and global catastrophe, the reality may be far different. World War III may not be fought with stealth bombers turning cities into post-apocalyptic wastelands. Instead, the next great war will be fought in data centers as armies of hackers fight other armies of hackers to render enemy infrastructure useless while trying to protect their own.

There is little use of the expense of a bomber when a few lines of code can cause a nuclear meltdown or disrupt the operation of a dam so millions become flooded out of their homes. If power stops and communications cease, how long will it take for people to run riot out of desperation? There is no need for an invading army to blow up a city when millions of civilians simply cut off from food and water will do the job themselves.

It is entirely possible we could be witnessing the return fire of the United States against North Korea.

However, North Korea is an exceptional country. Most of the population still makes do without electricity, at least for most of the day. As a result few people have internet anyway and a widespread internet outage will hardly impact the regime or the daily life of the people there.

The Battle for Catholic Education - Prevent the Collapse Now!

The outage could even be staged by the North Korean government to anger the people against the USA. There could also be a coup or a purge happening in the country and the outage is a way to delay news of the unfolding events. Anything is possible.

Regardless of what's actually happening, there will be a political ramification, and it isn't likely to be positive. If the regime of Kim Jong Un remains in power, it could use the internet outage as a pretext for a shooting war. North Korea could invade the South, sparking a new conflict with the world.

In light of recent accusations and threats made by the U.S. government, it remains likely that the outage in North Korea is the result of American retaliation and how that retaliation is resolved by an angry North Korean government remains to be seen.

---

'Help Give every Student and Teacher FREE resources for a world-class Moral Catholic Education'