North Korea’s “Secret Cyber-Weapon”: Red Star OS

© 2010 KFA Forum

North Korea has had its own internet from a long time now. Their internet is free of any American influence and now, they have their own operating system to power that internet. The Red Star OS is a Linux based OS, developed by orders from Kim Jong-il.


The OS has been developed by North Korean IT specialists to meet the needs and requirements of the North Korean people and the government, respectively. News of its release and existence got known, thanks to a student from North Korea’s Kim Il-sung University. The student is a Russian individual and writes a blog from the Russian embassy in Pyongyang.


Although Kim Jong-il is willing to go forward with this Operating System, it is not exactly the people’s favorite. It still needs a lot of polishing according to the local populace. For this reason, they still prefer using Windows XP and Windows Vista over this snappy OS.


Red Star is available for $5 and comes in the Server and the Desktop edition. Though, the apps available for the OS are selling at twice the price and need to be bought separately.


The language of the OS is “Korean only” and it takes around 15 minutes to install. The minimum system requirement is 256 MB of RAM and a Pentium III processor coupled with a 3 GB hard-disk space. Ironically, the web browser is named “My Country” which is actually a Firefox fork.


You can give Red Star version 2.0 a test run, provided you take a test flight to North Korea and get hold a copy from the nearest information kiosk.
 © 2010 Kanjilal  C , Red Star OS: Linux distro from North Korea

More Information: 
North Korea’s “secret cyber-weapon”: brand new Red Star OS  by North Korean Economy Watch 

Douro20 says :  "This OS was designed to copy everything the user types in and receives and, upon a backdoor request, transmit this information to the North Korean police. Don't say I didn't warn you."