.KP the ccTLD of North Korea
North Korea isn’t quite a black hole on the Internet anymore; the world’s latest nuclear-capable nation seems to be gaining more access.
Recently, TransTeleCom, a major Russian telecommunications provider, became the second Internet pipeline to North Korea.
Until October 1st, only China provided Internet access to North Korea, and by having two providers, North Korea gains a fall-back option.
This is bad news for the US Cyber Command centers, that rely on North Korea’s limited Internet access to facilitate activities of national interest.
In the past, the Chinese link was targeted via DDoS attacks, attributed to the “Anonymous” but in 2014 the New York Times wondered if US intelligence services had carried out the action.
North Korea operates from the dot .KP ccTLD, which was allocated on September 24, 2007. For a nation existing since 1948, this has to be the most recent allocation of a national ccTLD, as most of them were allocated in the 1980’s or the 1990’s.
Domestically, North Korea uses its own version of the Internet, Kwangmyong – essentially, an intranet. Don’t expect any North Korean domain investors to come out of the woods, any time soon. 😀
As of 2017, at least nine .KP top level domains and more than 30 active domains are registered, per below:
airkoryo.com.kp
cooks.org.kp
friend.com.kp
gnu.rep.kp
kass.org.kp
kcna.kp
kiyctc.com.kp
knic.com.kp
kptc.kp
ksf.com.kp
korean-books.com.kp
koredufund.org.kp
korelcfund.org.kp
korfilm.com.kp
lrit-dc.star.net.kp
ma.gov.kp
masikryong.com.kp
mediaryugyong.com.kp
mfa.gov.kp
naenara.com.kp
nta.gov.kp
portal.net.kp
pyongyangtimes.com.kp
rcc.net.kp
rep.kp
rodong.rep.kp
ryongnamsan.edu.kp
sdprk.org.kp
silibank.net.kp
star-co.net.kp
star-di.net.kp
star.co.kp
star.edu.kp
star.net.kp
tourismdprk.gov.kp
vok.rep.kp
