North Korea has recently stepped up its crackdown on people who own “extra” memory cards. The mere possession of such cards is considered equivalent to viewing or distributing foreign media.
Speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons, a source in North Pyongan Province told Daily NK on Thursday that the Ministry of State Security has recently been checking people for memory cards they do not use.
The source explained that the North Korean authorities have begun to prosecute those who possess extra data storage devices (such as SD cards and microSD cards) as severely as if they had used a Chinese-made cell phone to talk to people overseas or consumed media from other countries, such as South Korean movies, dramas, news or music.
For example, a thirty-something male resident of Sinuiju, North Pyongan Province, is currently under investigation after being caught with an SD card, the source said.
The man’s SD card contained only a handful of North Korean songs and no movies, videos, publications, books, or songs from South Korea, which North Korean authorities call the “puppet regime.”
However, North Korean authorities inferred from the man’s possession of an extra SD card that he may have come in contact with “outside information” such as South Korean movies, TV shows, or songs.
Daily NK could not confirm whether the man had a criminal record for accessing foreign information and media content.
In the same area, a man in his forties was passing through a cell phone checkpoint when a microSD card turned up in his personal belongings.