Further Reading North Korea drops off the Internet in suspected DDoS attack

It’s well known that North Korea’s Internet access is scant at best—only the country’s elite have access. In fact, there’s only about 1,000 assigned IP addresses

But according to a new report by NKNews, foreigners can now access the Internet not only on their phones (through the state-run mobile company Koryolink) but now through Pyongyang’s Wi-Fi network.

“Only devices with foreigners-only SIM cards can access Pyongyang’s Wi-Fi,” Reverend Choi Jae-yeong told the site. “So ordinary citizens of Pyongyang can’t access it.”

The service was “fast enough to watch online videos and surf the Web with ease,” according to the report.

In October 2014, Choi reported in a Korean-language essay that buying a North Korean SIM costs $200 with a $22 monthly fee—that includes just 50MB of mobile data, with overage fees at $0.28 per megabyte.

Foreigners have been allowed to bring their own phones into North Korea since January 7, 2013 and have been allowed to use mobile data since March 2013. Jean Lee, a former reporter for the Associated Press who opened the AP’s Pyongyang bureau in 2012, famously sent out photos from inside North Korea via Instagram.

NKNews also notes that while direct calls from North Korea to South Korea are blocked, the Internet itself is surprisingly uncensored. So anyone inside the Hermit Kingdom could conceivably use any number of messaging services to communicate with the South.