North Korea seen using ChatGPT in AI education

Seoul: North Korea is apparently using ChatGPT, a generative artificial intelligence (AI) service developed by OpenAI of the United States, in its higher education AI studies, according to a media report on Saturday.

According to the report from Voice of Korea, a Pyongyang external propaganda outlet, members of an AI research institute at Kim Il Sung University were seen learning ChatGPT and its functionalities, reports Yonhap news agency.

Learning material used by the institute explained how ChatGPT generates text based on user input. Given North Korea’s heavily restricted internet access, it is unclear whether researchers have direct access to the service.

Han Chol-jin, a researcher at Kim Il Sung University, said the institute is focused on teaching ways to understand and acquire advanced technology and adapt it for domestic use.

Earlier this month, Choson Sinbo, a pro-Pyongyang newspaper based in Japan, reported on global AI developments and the growing concerns and restrictions surrounding China’s DeepSeek.

The outlet criticized Western restrictions on Chinese AI technologies, claiming they are part of an effort to limit China’s technological growth. It also stated that China has developed a low-cost AI model comparable to ChatGPT without advanced semiconductors.

Meanwhile, OpenAI said it has banned user accounts that were potentially used to facilitate a deceptive employment scheme possibly connected to North Korea, as it seeks to ensure its AI models are not utilised for malicious purposes.

In an updated report, the ChatGPT maker revealed that actors in question generated content consisting of personal documentation for fictitious “job applicants,” such as resumes, online job profiles and cover letters as it pointed to the North’s scheme to deploy IT workers overseas to create hard currency to support the Pyongyang regime.

“The activity we observed is consistent with the tactics, techniques and procedures Microsoft and Google attributed to an IT worker scheme potentially connected to North Korea,” the company said in the report, titled “Disrupting malicious uses of our models.”

“While we cannot determine the locations or nationalities of the actors, the activity we disrupted shared characteristics publicly reported in relation to North Korean state efforts to funnel income through deceptive hiring schemes, where individuals fraudulently obtain positions at Western companies to support the regime’s financial network,” it added.

—IANS