14 DAY TRIAL // After having launched their official Twitter page only last week, North Korea’s account was banned in South Korea because it reportedly contained illegal data, according to Seoul representatives.
Considering the official North Korea website is Uriminzokkiri.com, when a Twitter account called @uriminzok was created, everyone considered that the socialist country had decided to finally make use of Twitter’s many benefits.
Despite the fact that the exact founders of @uriminzok remain unknown, they are believed to be individuals from the Pyongyang government.
Roughly translated as ‘Our People,’ the account in question already has more than 9,800 followers even though it only tweeted 58 times in order to glorify the country and to criticize South Korea and the US.
The reaction to this position was for South Korea’s state-run Communications Standards Commission to block access to the account so that its inhabitants could no longer read the tweeted propaganda - a warning message shows up when South Koreans try to access the page.
It is worth mentioning that North Korea also has a dedicated YouTube channel which serves the same purpose as the Twitter account, and which has not been banned (yet).
The content on both the YouTube and the Twitter accounts is not targeted at North Korea’s citizens since the large majority of them do not even have Internet access, therefore the Pyongyang group is probably trying to reach out to supporters outside the country.
US authorities have also responded to this approach, and Philip Crowley, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs tweeted that “North Korean government has joined Twitter, but is it prepared to allow its citizens to be connected as well?”
Currently, the question on everyone’s minds is whether South Korea’s ban was really justified considering they claim that laws have been broken.
Despite the fact that the @uriminzok tweets mostly looked like self-promotion and taunting, it is possible for the Seoul government to have felt threatened and reacted to protect its nation.
However, this ban also looks like they have restricted the right to free speech, using censorship to deny South Korea inhabitants the possibility to access certain type of information.