in north korea and the basic framework is in the different generations that we have in north korea. i would like to have the different generations in north korea. there is the market mechanism in north korea and has been in place for about 20 years by now coming into the market economy for north korea is an economy that is outside of the planned economy that north korea was and there is a new generation of those who were born perhaps sometimes after the 1970s and who have grown up watching this take place and so the parent generation of distribution received these subsidies from the planned economy that the new generation hasn't actually received the distributions from the government regime so they have actually not seen the socialist regime at work. they actually do not have as much loyalty to the regime. what they have seen if their mom and dad working in these market economies and producing income from these market economies so these are two different generations. this is the stories are two different people in north korea. there is a hypothetical person in my story. he is 34-yea

>> of north korea. this is a country that doesn't have a lot of resources or money, but they're spending it on building basically signer attackers who previously had been specializing in attacks on south korea. this is the first time we see this coming against an american country. the scary thing is, you know, that they can do this against a movie studio, imagine if they did this against a bank or major financial institution in the united states, what the repercussions would be. >> we spoke to the assistant attorney general for national security here in "the situation room" the other day. he said boldly that if, in fact, this was a regime, a country, maybe 90% of all u.s. companies out there are vulnerable to this kind of attack. >> you have a country, they test missiles, they go 500 miles and go off course. he doesn't have enough nuclear weapons to threaten the united states. but if they have grade-one hackers that can penetrate any computer network out there, it puts him on par with a country like our

also, there are new developments involving north korea. guess what? north korea's internet is down. who's responsible for that? we've got new information coming into "the situation room." it's more than the driver. it's more than the car. for lotus f1 team, the competitive edge is the cloud. powered by microsoft dynamics, azure, and office 365, the team can gain real time insights and instantly share information around the globe. when every millisecond counts, staying competitive begins with the cloud. this is the microsoft cloud. >>> we continue to follow the breaking news in new york city where the mayor, bill de blasio, is asking people to put aside protests until after the funerals of the two police officers who were brutally killed over the weekend. but we're also following reports that north korea's internet system all of a sudden collapsed today. the reports come as the state department put new pressure on north korea to admit that it was behind the cyber attack on sony pictures. let's bring in our global affairs correspondent, elise labott, who's working this story for us. w

before north korea. ... now we have over 8 million travelers. in 1992 when the two countries normalize with each other it was 130,000 mostly of course recently the fta was conquered. they also seem to have a common front in targeting japan. i don't know if that is a good thing or a bad thing but in terms of korea it has contributed. so on an independent basis great relationship but when you start to look into and the relations in the larger context of u.s. china relations, things are more complicated and things don't look so rosy. this is despite the denial in the indicted states and china that there was a logic that does not apply and i think they do. what do i mean by that? save jokes to positioning of the old traditional order and the emergence of the new order. the old order is the traditional international region where the united states plays a very central role. it is supposed to reinforce this old order that has existed since the end of world war ii and the success of this pivot is contingent on a clo

media outlets. >> hello, north korea! >> the cyberattack was apparently motivated by the sony movie "the interview," a plot against north korea's leader. >> after threats of violence sony decided to cancel the movie. but president obama in his end of year news conference criticized that decision. >> yes, i think they made a mistake. we cannot have a society in which some dictator some place can start imposing censorship here in the united states. because if someone is able to intimidate folks out of releasing a satirical movie, imagine what they'll start to do if they see a documentary that they don't like or news report that they don't like. >> but sony disagrees with the president. they issued a statement. sony ceo said that they don't own movie theaters and cannot determine what movie a theater will show, but what is left unclear is whether sony plans to put "the interview" back on the market. >> very interesting. i want to talk a little bit about the options that are on the table. you mentioned there are options out t

he said north korea and north korea aloneau

why isn't north korea blaming over the internet outage in north korea. is that proof it is not the united states doing it? >> i think the north koreans who are conspiracy minded any way, think the same thing is true for the good friends in this, the chinese. it may well not be us. but if it isn't, it doesn't matter what is true. what matters is what the chinese and the north koreans think and they are very, very focused on blaming the world's problems on us. >> and this question about north korea and how fragile the internet is, and one of the poorest in the world and they believe their leader is a god and something we haven't seen in the western world for a long time. who in north korea has the access, when you look at the 1,024, who are those people. >> the kim family and seniors and generals and admirals and those in security. so it is a layered group. the north korean regime is the four groups. the kim family, the security services the party and the military. at the top level of all of those you'll have people with unrestricted internet access. >> un

policy toward north korea in your judgment? >> i think the -- it would be far more likely that north korea would do some kind attack in the south. i don't think they would have carried out attacks against theaters in the u.s. and in that sense the sony pulling of the film was a mistake as well as some of the other movie companies that have pulled other films related to north korea. obviously, we have to be vigilant against north korean attacks, but i think it was an overreaction by sony. >> it is an exact parallel to president obama's white house begging google to take down the anti-mohammed, anti-muslim video on youtube. this time it is a mistake. then it was national policy because the president was the one asking. bruce clinger, we thank you for being with us. >> thank you very much. >>> president obama's illegal immigrant amnesty executive fiat losing its first test in federal court, so what >>> homeland security secretary jay johnson claimed that the president does have the authority to carry out his amnesty plan. >> in my

>> naming and shaming north korea. it's a step that you have all the evidence now but haven't taken the step of publicly calling them out. it's something that took them years to do, frankly, john, with china with cyber attacks on u.s. companies in the government. multiple times for years and took them a number of years before publicly called them out. that's a first step. if they're able to determine who the actual hackers are by name and id, they could take a step again they took against an elite group of chinese hackers of filing charges against them. you're not going to take them into court, they're on the other side of the ocean but you could file charges publicly. but in the near term, raise the economic costs for north korea, tighten economic sanctions on the country. i'll tell you the most powerful one they could do is go after their access to dollar-denominated trade. this is north korea's lifeline to the outside world and by squeezing chinese banks that do business with north korea, you could exact an economic

because they're buddies with north korea. so what are you really accomplishing in a meeting like this? >> this is a big deal for two reasons. one is it's the first time a human rights issue really has been brought into the security council. this is the forum that typically debates peacekeeping, nonproliferation. now this is about human rights but a broader story about ten members of the security council deciding that this has gone too far. there are 200,000 people in camps. millions of people starving. this rises to the level of responsibility of the duty to protect and happens again, perhaps coincidentally, as this cyber back and forth is going on, but it's a long unfolding story which china really has been -- i won't say complicit in but been allowing to tapes, and if they allow this meeting to go forward, which they'll do, it's a big deal because it means that china as well, even though they're going to have to defend north korea, they're getting to realize that this is more of a nuisance. >> you talk about the coincidence

did north korea win? >>> and is the release of a spy for almost 20 years, a man that almost no one knew he existed, who is the mystery spy. >>> and as the terror attack rises in pakistan, we have new video tracking the steps of the killers inside of that school. let's go outfront. >>> good evening. i'm erin burnett. and "outfront" tonight, the breaking news, the white house calls the crippling attack on sony pictures, a quote, serious national security matter but today no formal response from the white house. one day after cnn reported that u.s. investigators concluded that north korean leaders ordered the attack. a statement from the administration blaming north korea and laying out the response was anticipated as early today instead a white house spokesperson didn't use the words north korea in responding to questions about the attack, simply saying the investigation is ongoing. >> i'm not prepared to ascribe any accountability for this specific act or to describe who might have been the sophisticated a

that is to contain north korea. i thought it was interesting that the north korea has one big ally in the world, and that is its neighbor china. i thought it was interesting that the president ruled out china or any other state actor assisting north korea. there has been some speculation, and let's face it, we don't know what happens inside north korea but the presumption was that north korea would not have the technology know how to pull this off. >> let's talk about cuba. we've had a little bit of time to di jesus this news and the normalization. he defended it a little bit. how do you think he did? >> president obama, first of all in general he had the air and demeanor of a man who was about to leave for 17 days in hawai'i for family vacation. i felt like the white house on down are confident feel like they are on the right side of history on this. he he said lifting the embargo may take some time. marco rubio said he's going to fight tooth and nail. john boehner said he does not want to bring it up on the house

north korea caught red-handed. today the fbi officially blaming north korea for hacking sony pictures. and now the pressure is mounting for the obama administration to do something and to do that something quickly and severely. this cyber attack could be just the first shot across the bow. but during his year-end news conference president obama refusing to announce any specific response. and at today's pentagon news conference rear admiral john kirby were was asked if the cyber attack were an act of war. >> i'm also, you know, not able to lay out in any specificity for you what would be or wouldn't be an act of war in the cyber domain. >> lieutenant colonel oliver north joins us. good evening, sir. >> greta. >> we've seen the new war nation against nation. nation against an ideology. and now is this a new war? and will the administration not call it that? >> admiral kirby and the president are in a difficult spot because neither nato nor the united nations have defined what an act of cyber war would be. interesting

believes 100% came from north korea. the white house has been presented with options from advisers and those could include further sanctions against north korea. including banking and economic sectors. christine. >> michelle kosinski in hawaii. thank you. let's break this down with the host of sources. brian stelter. this goes from bad to worse to crazy, frankly. when you look at the response from north korea who says we did not do it, but will do more if you respond in a way we don't like. the president using the word cyber vandalism. the president weighing in on how a company is responding. remarkable. >> rarely have we ever seen this. the president saying sony made a mistake. one of the biggest media companies in the world. i wonder if he would have said that if it were disney. it is interesting it is not an act of war. he worried openly about the self censorship. he said that about cnn. cnn covered north korea. what happens if they break into cnn? >> is hollywood already changing its ways? look at some of the scripts

now to the lead and more on the north korea and sony arehack. outages, even more of them, as parts of the country are back online. is it the u.s. or sony pictures itself? told trishtom ridge regan how he would like the u.s. to respond. >> i would like them to click on the internet and see the stars be theipes flag and may star-spangled banner being played. that would send a message that says, look, we know who you are. we can get into your system. don't do it again. >> jordan robertson joins us from washington and also lucas shaw. width of theatest sony decision to seemingly reversed themselves and show the movie? >> the latest is that sony has issued a statement from sony .ntertainment ceo mike litton they haven't provided much more detail on that they said they are try to get more platforms and they want it in as many theaters as possible. it is unclear how many that will be. >> a big reversal for sony. the individuals who run sony have been under the gun. before the focus on the movie, the focus was on the individuals running sony. why this k

evan talked about the capability of north korea, which is pretty stunning, because in north korea, they basically don't have access to the internet. that hasn't stopped the regime from grooming the best and brightest to wage cyber warfare. we are live out in front in south korea. and what can you tell us kyong? in a country when you don't have the internet are shocked this capability exists? >> and that is a feeling a lot of south koreans had for sometime, until last year. last year 2013 in june there was a widespread attack on south korea, on banks where people couldn't withdraw money from atms and some of the high-profile companies here in south korea. it is an awakening called as dark sol. things went dark. that might sound weird to sony. but there are sleuths here trying to figure out if there is similarities to what happened to sony and what happened here next year and that is where they will try to connect the dots back to north korea and learn something new. what is key here is this was a cyber war, a cyber war on both sides of the border knew what was happening. south koreans kn

it helps push china away from north korea by focusing on the complete unacceptability of what north korea is doing to its own , thee in the gulags suppression of their own people. you embarrass china. will unlikely this debate affect north korean behavior. >> today, new york city's mayor met with relatives. over the deaths of eric garner and michael brown, the mayor made this appeal in the wake of the cop killings. the time for every new yorker to think about these families. put them first. by respecting their pain and their time of mourning. this is a process. , put asiderotests demonstrations. until the funerals are passed, let's focus on these families and what they have lost. a brief time ago with a 28 year veteran of the police force that then founded the investigations. there has been a lot of attention since these officers were murdered. using the police and the communities have been broken? or can it be fixed? >> these are what happened because of the police. communities come out and fight for that. these communities are poor communities and there is a lot of different issues besi

friday in pyongyang, north korea. wherever you're watching from around the world, thank very much for joining us. up first a crippling cyber terror attack about to be officially blamed on north korea. an announcement expected as early as today by the obama administration. u.s. officials believe the north korean leadership directly ordered the attack on sony pictures and the fallout from the attack keeps on growing. sony is being criticized by some for canceling the christmas day release of the movie at the center of the controversy. the movie titled "the interview" angered north korea because it depicts a plot to assassinate the north korean leader, kim jong-un. pamela brown is joining us now. what have you learned about the u.s. linking the attack directly to north korea? because as you know, the north korean government has flatly denied it was responsible and praised all the criticism of the film, but it doesn't -- it insists it had nothing to do with the hacking? >> you're right. the north korean government has den

he knows nothing about north korea, the u.s. bombing during the korean war, the standoff, the military crises over the last 20, 30 years, the cost of , north andpeople south. all he is interested in his making money and getting stoned. i think it is shameful that people all over hollywood, george clooney, looking at this as some sort of freedom issue. let's look at the real role of the u.s. and korea and -- you can make comedies about korea, "mashn make comedies like ," but let's have some humanity in these films. >> leaked e-mails between sony producer scott rudin & executive amy pascal are also making headlines. mail she wrote -- they continued exchanging e-mails. executives later apologized. we have other north korean agents lower hollywood -- in hollywood that understand this? i kind of doubt it. if you look at the early stories of this hack, which is important to do, because before north korea came up as a source, there are many articles in the press about this. it shows extensive knowledge of sony, who is who, where their

will china is a neighbor and partner to north korea but it also blunts north korea and the un influence of the world. >> reporter: this is an issue we have been looking into for several days christine. here is the reality. north korea relies on china for internet access. up until four years ago, north korea had to dial in to go online. now north korea has a small fragile connection. to launch the complicated cyber attack like the one on sony it requires a stable high speed connection. as we saw with the fact that the north korean internet has been unstable in recent days is there a possibility that chinese servers were involved? that is something u.s. law enforcement is looking into and they asked the chinese government for help in the investigation. to say china is involved beyond that we need to keep in mind that united states law enforcement suspect no other country other than north korea orchestrating this attack. this infrastructure is stronger and faster in china than north korea. >> will ripley thank you for that in beijing. >>> 27 minutes after the hour. we are all over the brea

right at north korea. the u.s. government is expected to publicly blame the regime as early as today. the big question is what will the u.s. do about it? because so far the silence has been deafening. >> cnn learning that investigators have evidence that hackers stole the credentials of a system administrator getting access to the studio's computer system. meaning it was not an inside job. the losses for sony go far beyond canceling the release of the controversial film. it could be the costliest cyberattack against a company in u.s. history. let's begin with senior washington correspondent joe johns what do we know? >> the white house and the u.s. is waiting for investigators at the fbi and the justice department to wrap up their investigation as the administration tries to deal with the fallout. from sony's decision to essentially pull the film. >> the obama administration is ready to point the finger at north korea for the unprecedented sony hack. a move that could come as early as this morning. >> we're conside

our top stories, back online in north korea. the internet was shut down for hours in the reclusive state. was this a cyber attack, and retaliation for the hacking of sony pictures? >>> as australia mourns the victims of the sydney cafe siege, the prime minister warns that another attack is likely. >> there has been a heightened level of terrorist chatter in the aftermath of the martin place siege. that's why it's important

well, your panel was talking about north korea. we relaxed sanctions on north korea. we've relaxed sanctions on iran. has that worked? the fact of the matter is these are reimpressive presrepressive. this policy hasn't worked but not necessarily because it's bad policy. helms/burton was pass nld an overwhelmingly bipartisan fashion and signed by president clinton. on a bipartisan fashion this has been the policy of the united states for 50 years and helms/burton is 18 years. i would argue it's not because of bad policies, because we're dealing with bad and evil people, a repressive regime that has backed terrorists around the world and is going to threaten the national security of america and not improve lives of cuban people. >> senator cardin, that's the other side of the argument you hear, that president obama has given up too much to the cubans in return for too little. another senator from your foreign relations committee, senator marco rubio. >> these changes will lead to legitimacy for a government that shamelessly, continuously abuses human rights, but it will

the president making news that there will b response to north korea thehat administrati identified north korea the sauce of the attack on sony. the president said it was a mistake for sony to pull the film. we'll have more on this throughout the day. including the news at 4:00 eastern time. i'm david shuster. thanks for watching. real characters... >> creator of "all in the family" "the jeffersons" and "good times" talks race, comedy and american culture today... >> you're taking me to a place in this interview, i haven't been before... >> i told you this would be your best interview >> ...and it is... it's the current one... >> every monday, join us for exclusive... revealing... and surprising talks with the most interesting people of our time... talk to al jazeera, only on al jazeera america >> this is puerto galera in the philippines. i've been coming here for over a decade. for me, it's like a second home.

work there are four networks in north korea. you said there is one line out. can you explain how that works? >> the networks are referred to bgp, border gateway protocols. we use that for the work in internet performance. there are four routes. each is a range of continuous isp addresses. each computer if it is on the internet and communicating, it has some sort of ip address. >> there are 1024 ip addresses and all of north korea. i think i have more than that in this room. >> i bet you do. the internet of the united states which is the biggest has a little under one billion unique ip addresses. i had a discussion with a news organization from japan this morning -- 167 million ip addresses represent the internet of japan. it is 1000 -- a little over 100 million for south korea. this is a microscopic network. this internet did not play a big role in society in north korea. very few people have access to it. a handful of websites, mostly government websites. it has nearly nobody out of the many people in north korea, almost nobody

north korea, i think, this is going to be a story that's going to live for some time beyond north korea because, carl, the issue of cyber terrorism, the threat of cyber terrorism, it's something many in washington have been warning about, but there hasn't been sort of a public embracing of a sense of urgency to tackle the issue. now that might finally change and dominate much of the next two years as well. >> chuck todd in washington. we'll see you in the morning. of course chuck will have a lot more on the president's tough talk on north korea and the cuba story tomorrow on "meet the press". >>> after a sluggish start to the holiday shopping season, stores are hoping to make up ground in a big way. and today also known as super saturday could be key to retailers hitting their sales targets. with an improving economy, experts say shoppers will spend a little more even if they wait until the last minute. nbc's hallie jackson is live in glendale, california for us. >> reporter: good evening, carl. this shopping center is seeing bigger crowds today than it did on the saturday before christ

there's more interest in north korea. part of that is because the general public -- because of its access issue tends to look at north korea sometimes as if it's the moon. another planet. that in turn drives a push for sensationalism and mainstream journalists that don't cover north korea that often. that's one issue. we have a big challenge with small stories that just echo chamber into extremely sensational tabloid nonsense very quickly which even get traction from quite prestigious outlets. so that's one thing. access is another. in a different way to the way jean and paul have said. so we specialize in only north korea. we do it day-to-day, which is in the slow summer days of august can be very, very difficult. you know, we are really struggling sometimes to find leads for stories to do something original and it's those times when personally it does get to you and you just wish this could be a bit more of a normal country and access and get in and interview various people and find leads for content. that's something t

insisting he means to stand up to north korea. this time the president said he will give a proportional response aimed at north korea. he didn't elaborate further. reports suffered that the president is considering retaliation. he's actually thinking about putting north korea back on the list of state sponsors of terrorism. that designation would put north korea along syria, cuba, and iran. a designation that so far has done nothing to stop bashar and the president two days ago beginning his attempt to normalize relations with raul castro and cuba. when asked about the long-term effect of his unilateral action, the president had nothing concrete to say. obama: i think it would be unrealistic for me to map out exactly where cuba will be. but change is going to come to cuba. it has to. lou: it has to. the president also asked about working with a new republican congress next year and the looming battles over his rule by fiat. mr. obama had one suggestion for the republican leadership: he thinks it would be democratic, progressive an

did north korea win? >>> and is the release of a spy for almost 20 years, a man that almost no one knew he existed, who is the mystery spy. >>> and as the terror attack rises in pakistan, we have new video tracking the steps of the killers inside of that school. let's go outfront. >>> good evening. i'm erin

is the cyberwar the real war for north korea? >> translator: raising cyberagents is fairly cheap, he says. the world has the wrong view of the north korean state. with that incorrect world view, north korea was able to increase its ability to launch cyberattacks. south korea learned the hard way. banks across the country last year were paralyzed, atms frozen for days. media outlets went dark, servers jammed or wiped. north korea denied it was the source of the hack. but in the wake of the attack, south korea beefed up its own cyberforce, declaring the online war as dangerous as pyongyang's nuclear ambitions. north korea exists in the land of over the top propaganda, while experts say it wages its parallel war in cyberspace, led by a young man of the internet age ushering in a new phase of the korean conflict. what north korea craves most is visibility on the global map. what this hack of sony has done is given them exactly that. kyung lah, cnn, seoul. >>> now the presumption we keep coming back to here is that north korea attacke

north korea is responsible for the hack on sony. now, sources close to the matter are telling fox business that top sony executives have been working 24/7 to find a ray way to release the movie. the chairman and ceo, we're reporting that he is adamant that the movie airs somewhere, somehow. dish network told i agree inwas unavailable to comment on the story. sony stands to lose $200 million by outright canceling "the interview." a sony spokesperson says there's no decision. they're still exploring options. sony is concerned, of course, if it never runs the movie, the long-term damage to sony's reputation could be very harsh. everyone from the writer's guild to george clooney say that by allowing a rogue nation to determine how and when a movie is released stops freedom of creativity. dish emerged as a possible outlet. they declined. as for competitors, sources tell fox business that directv will not be offering the movie. we should also add that dish network is currently in a dispute with fox. what is next for this sony saga, what d

they trade with north korea. some it north kornorth koreans travel into china. most average north koreans never heard of the internet, certainly never had free access to it. simple reason being that north korea wants its people to remain isolated and don't want them though see things on the internet to give them a glimpse outside. the cyber unit to the bureau 121, these technical minds hand picked from pyongyang university are going to places like china, setting up shop in hotels where there's access to broadband internet, and that's where law enforcement officials believe they're launching these attacks from. so according to one senior obama administration official, the u.s. has reached out to china and asked for that country's assistance in investigating this and hopefully putting a stop to it if they can. >> isn't it fascinating and so terribly sad that they're so isolated from the world that their citizens don't know about the internet, but anyway, yes, you've been there. so you've seen that isolation, the creepy isolation. but north korea again, says it wan

and north korea. joining me is the author of "genesis code" and brian stelter, host of "reliable sources." jamie, it's hard to believe it was just a week ago when we got that obscure message from hackers that was going to threaten anybody that went and saw that movie on christmas day, was going to be in big trouble, making references to 9/11. and now we see theaters are going to go ahead with this. do we think that north korea will react in any way? what do we suspect? >> well, certainly i don't think there's a high likelihood that there will be 9/11 attacks on theaters coming from north korea. it's going to anger them in some way but, frankly, north korea is behaving so terribly, even worse than usual, i really can't imagine how we could have any worse relations with north korea. but at the same time, now that the movie is being released and hats off to wonderful people like michael in atlanta and others around the country, we have a real opportunity in this country not just to talk about freedom of

north korea itself? a mystery ahead. >>> in north korea, the internet service is back on this morning after a nine and a half hour long total blackout in north korea. this follows the u.s. claims that pyongyang was behind the cyber attack on sony pictures which ended the studio to pull the picture of "the interview." barbara starr has latest. >> reporter: a lot of people wondering if the u.s. could be behind this. could this be the counter attack or response the white house promised for north korea's hacking against sony? it may be hard to figure out who is behind it. some saying maybe the north koreans turned off the system. maybe china cut off access. nobody talking about it. here at the pentagon, the game is about cyber defense right now. options being developed to improve pentagon defenses against potential north korean hacking. security already very tight on classified computer network systems. a lot of working done to make sure all of the systems are fully secure and developing options for the pres

in north korea. as the first panel of our 2014 wilson center washington forum, let me just, before i turn the mic over to the chair of the session, say how deeply grateful we are to the university and the institute for far eastern studies, as well as the university of north korean studies for the partnership that we've had for now 80 years. we started this in 2006. on a very small basis. and this has grown into really a flourishing partnership on the history of our relationship. but also well beyond that, on the political relevance of the materials and the history that we've been uncovering. i think it's one of the things that sets the wilson center's korea programming apart, is that we have had for these many years a steadfast partner in kim yung university. we're consulting on really a weekly basis with our partners on activities, on conferences and publications. and i hope many of you will take advantage of some of the materials that are on the table outside. really at the heart of this relationsh

they attributed to north korea. is that the most accurate way to determine the origins of a hack? >> well, i think it's the most direct way to determine those oogenies but i believe there are other attributes of that attack that they can assign to attribution. ip addresses is the simplest way, but there will be other factors tha and significantels that the fbi intelligence can determine attribution. >> how could north korea pull off such a sophisticated cyberattack? >> well, i think--i don't know the details of the intelligence findings, but we presume that it's been coming from north korea physically. they may have used a proxy. they could have conducted the attack elsewhere. i don't know all the details of what's been discovered through the forensics investigation. i think we have to understand that. we might assign attribution to north korea. there might be other intelligence sources that lead us to that conclusion. the attack itself may have come from some place elsewhere internet access is widely available. the

people who watch north korea have never seen this before. there's sometimes some slow service trying to get to the page, but you never see this. the website briefly came back up hours later and then got replaced by a purple flower. so when you talk to internet security people as we have been through the day is that this looks like a hack. it doesn't look like something that the united states would bother with. it looks like something that perhaps an amateur might be doing to mess with north korea. the website does appear to be working right now, but rosemary, it is very slow. it is moving very, very slowly, and it does fail every once in a while. so this isn't over yet. >> no, it doesn't seem to be. many thanks to you reporting from seoul, south korea. >>> the u.s. ambassador says life in north korea is a live willing nightmare. samantha power spoke monday as a the u.n. security council took up north korea's human rights record. the council was urged to refer north korea to the international criminal court for crimes against humanity. >> i a

how will north korea react? we're covering all sides of the breaking news. >>> we're following breaking news. a huge about face by sony. they will release "the interview" in a limited release at independent theaters around the united states. elise labott is watching for reaction from north korea. what are you picking up, elise? >> wolf, president obama has said he welcomes the decision to reverse course and release the film. the question now is, will north korea retaliate after merciless threats against the u.s. if they release the film. kim jong-un portrays himself a man of the people, a revered leader depicted as inspiring such edadoration, the public crs at the sight of him. >> i think it says something interesting about north korea that they decided to have the state mount an all out assault on a movie studio because of a move. >> reporter: it was a calculated move to cement his grip on power showing his people he will stand up to america. >> they feel that we feel that he's weak, he's not decisive. this is

tonight, north korea's internet is down. the question is did washington just pull the plug on kim jong-un? late new details coming in. stand by for that. but let's begin with the breaking news and a call for unity in a deeply divide new york. new york's mayor bill de blasio asking new yorkers to put aside their differences and put a lid on protests until after two fallen new york police officers are laid to rest. he reaffirmed that call in a statement just moments ago, calling on the city to heal. wenjian liu and raphael ramos were shot and killed execution style by a deranged man demanding retribution for the death of eric garner this summer. liu's widow spoke to reporters. >> the liu family would like to express our gratitude and appreciation to the police department, our neighbors, the entire new york community, friends and co-workers for the help and support. we would also like to express our condolence to the officer and his family. this is a difficult time for both of our families. but we will stand together and get th

>> it a victory for north korea. they react strongly to anything they receive as an insult to the leader or regime. they took this movie very seriously in june or july. the government characterized it as an act of war, an act of terror and called upon president obama as well as the u.n. sh secretary general to prevent the release of the movie. to beld you expect them emboldened by this and looking at other things? >> i think they would. we have known they have robust cyber warfare capability. they have been linked to previous cyber attacks against u.s. government agencies, south korean agencies, as well as banks, businesses, and media organizations. >> the white house says they are weighing their responses. what realistically can the u.s. do in retaliation? >> there are a number of things they can do. contrary to the misperception north korea is the most heavily sanctioned country in the world, which is not true. have.s., you win and e.u. imposed stronger sanctions against iran. that is one reason iran came back to t

and the president referred to it that north korea and north korea alone was behind this attack? >> we've been tracking this and call them silent clima, the name for the group based out of north korea. >> reporter: say the name again. >> silent calima. it's a north korean mythical flying horse. we have been tracking them since 2006. they have been involved in a lot of destructive attacks. >> reporter: i ask you because there were questions in the last few days about whether north korea was capable of mountinmounting this kind of at. you're saying they clearly were. >> they absolutely are. they're not the best cyberpower out there. not as good as united states or russia or china but they're in the second tier and have this capability and they have been using it for the last eight years. >> woodruff: let me turn to another piece of this story, ambassador pritchard, and we know the president said sony made a mistake pulling back the film, and the reaction from sony c.e.o. what i want to ask you about at this point is the president's characterization of north korea's leader. at one p

korea. >> if north korea did this, is that an act of war? >> it's certainly an act against our country and against our interests. obviously an act of war has legal connotations but i think we have to stop kidding ourselves to think we have any chance of having a cordial or working relationship with north korea. as i said, this is an organized gang of criminals that run north korea and the sooner we face up to that and realize that's the reality, the better we are. what action the president wants to take, of course, as commander in chief, that's his prerogative. to call it an act of war, that's probably going too far at this stage but certainly is an act against national sovereignty. >> should this movie, do you believe, be released on christmas day and if it is, should security around the country be increased as a result of this threat? >> i don't believe we should be backing down to these threats and as far as security, i would lead that to the local police and theater themselves as to what they want to do. i know, for instance, in new york

it has to be north korea. the only other person with that capability is a 12-year-old with bit torrent. (laughter) the hackers also leaked unreleased scripts, including the script for "mall cop: blart 2 " -- what?! that movie has a script?! great. they just ruined the entire plot -- large man falls down! eh, i'll still see it. the hackers even left a calling card -- "hacked by gop." which is also what mitch mcconnell yells every time he successfully works his microwave. (laughter) in this case, the g.o.p. actually stands for guardians of peace, and they're demanding that sony cancel release of "the interview." or as they posted online, "do carry out our demand if you want to escape us. and stop immediately showing the movie of terrorism. you, sony and f.b.i. cannot find us. we are perfect as much." yes. (cheers and applause) which is either a threat or dialogue from the blart 2 script. (laughter) folks, this worries me because, over the last nine years, i've said some terrible things that could make this guy "

north korea in universe of north korean studies. and then after having studied north korea in theory i can find methodologies and need to make lots of contents why preserving the principles of the journalism. so i will just briefly give the title, 10 title, maybe helpful for you all. one is the basics. crosscheck, cross checked, crosscheck. when we crosscheck the information, we can get more information in doing so. and the second, major -- summit from north korea. for example, we can make a -- with the data north korea offe offers. the third, contact north korea directly, like jean. then we have to -- [inaudible] from the society of academia, social sciences or something like that. and the fifth, fact finding. the woodrow wilson center, niku project was in this document. and six, making short work of intellectual -- summit and seventh, making international sources. that is why i in here as a correspondent, washington correspondent for two years. eighth, a newsgathering in the propaganda image from north korea. yeah, we can find som

lawmakers are already blaming north korea. an announcement from the white house could happen in the coming hours. if blaming north korea is a forgone conclusion, the bigger question is how will the white house respond. cnn's pamela brown looks at some possible options. >> reporter: u.s. officials are looking to place the blame on north korea, pulling the plug on its comedy "the interview," depicting the assassination of kim jong un. >> take him out. >> law enforcement sources say the blueprint of the current attack mimicked a hack against media organizations last year. according to a north korean defector, the north koreans have a vast secretive network of hackers around the world called bureau 121. >> unit 121 is a highly sophisticated organization under the military branch of the people's republic of north korea. and what this group is designed to do is to advance their cyberwarfare capabilities. >> reporter: sony executives are calling the hack an act of terrorism. now the obama administration under mounting pressure to res