hankyoreh

unification and foreign affairs ministries

By Ha Eo-young, staff reporter

Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin allegedly received reports on the Cyber Command’s response to psychological operations directed at the South Korean online networks at the time of the 2012 general and presidential elections.

The Cyber Command’s psychological operations division is alleged to have interfered with the elections in its counter-operation. Kim himself denied hearing the reports before the National Assembly.

A source in the Ministry of National Defense office in charge of investigating the Cyber Command election interference allegations described the reports during a recent face-to-face briefing with lawmaker Jin Sung-joon, secretary of the Democratic Party’s fact-finding team investigating the incident.

“The Cyber Command made two kinds of reports to the Defense Minister - one on the day’s cyberspace trends in South Korea and abroad, and one on the results of the response to [North Korea’s] psychological operations against the South,” the source said on condition of anonymity.

“The reports on daily cyberspace trends were sent in black bags to 50 related agencies and by intranet to the Blue House,” the source added. “The in-person reports [to the Blue House] were supposed to be on certain ‘unusual’ things, although what those were I can’t say.”

The operational reports were compiled by collecting, analyzing, and quantifying the results of the Cyber Command psychological operations teams’ “counter-operations.” Operations at the time of the 2012 general and presidential elections included at least 2,020 internet posts expressing support for then-Saenuri Party (NFP) candidate and eventual winner Park Geun-hye and criticizing her opponents, Democratic Party candidate Moon Jae-in and independent Ahn Cheol-soo.

The division’s director, an individual surnamed Lee, is awaiting the first hearing on Feb. 11 for alleged political interference according to the military criminal code for directing the operations at the working level.

Although the operation results reported to Kim appear consistent with reports from Lee to current Blue House secretary for national defense and Yeon Je-wook and Cyber Command director Ok Do-kyung (Yeon’s successor) - and their subsequent orders for a response - the investigation office declined to indict either Yeon or Ok, and did not even question Kim. The office could have been limited by its status as a unit directly administrated by the Defense Minister.

Kim previously denied receiving any reports on operation results while answering questions at the National Assembly in November and December 2013.

“I don’t receive reports on project [operation] results,” Kim said at the time. “I receive situational reports - information on North Korean hacking attempts, the effects of North Korean propaganda and agitation attempts using cyberspace, things like that.”

“I only receive reports on cyberspace trends for North Korea and other neighboring countries,” Kim stressed.

Defense Ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok also said only the daily situation reports from the Cyber Command went before the Minister. “The investigation results bear this out,” he added.

The failure to investigate even after Kim received reports of online election interference by the Cyber Command can be traced to flaws in the investigation system, with the investigating body operating under the Minister’s own command. The investigation office also failed to mention Kim’s reports on the operation results when announcing its interim investigation findings, and to hold any questioning afterwards.

The questions of just how much of the psychological operations division’s activities were reported to Kim - who sits at the top of the Cyber Command chain of command - and what orders he may have given are crucial to understanding the nature of the case.

It now appears the only way of getting at the answers is to appoint a special prosecutor to look into the Cyber Command investigation, as was done with similar allegations of election interference by the National Intelligence Service.

“Being under the command of the Minister of National Defense, the investigation office was never in the position of being able to investigate the allegations thoroughly,” said Jin Sung-joon. “We need to bring in a special prosecutor to investigate and hold people accountable, whatever their status may be,” Jin added.

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