South Korea was ranked second in the 2008 broadband leadership, conducted by the Saïd Business School at Oxford and the University of Oviedo in Spain, and sponsored by Cisco Systems, the telecommunications equipment maker. This year, however, South Korea retakes the top spot in an annual ranking of broadband quality, achieving a broadband penetration rate of 97 percent and quality score of 66 points, followed by Japan with 64 percent and 64 points, respectively.

The study takes into account the download and upload speeds of Internet connections, rather than simply comparing market penetration rates since the quality of connections has grown more important as online services such as IPTV(Internet Protocol television) are expected to become popular in the near future.

The reason why South Korea was ranked second in the 2008 broadband leadership is that the broadband quality wasn’t good compared with its highest broadband penetration rate in the world. However, with the government’s continuous efforts such as the ultra broadband convergence network(UBcN) plan the broadband quality has been significantly improved as you can see below.

There is a swedish saying was that goes, ” Worry gives a small thing a big shadow”. This saying rings true, considering the recent cyberattacks on Korea. The current shadow is quite ominous despite no serious harm nor data-hacking was committed, but fear of an hidden North Korean aggression is overwhelming . However, Korea can seize this mishap to increase population’s level of awareness to cybersecurity.

As one of the most wired country of the world, Korea is exposed to an unprecedented extent. 93% of households are connected to Internet through HighSpeed Broadband, with an average PCs per 1000 population of 442. According to public statements of country’s biggest online security firm executive, the digital convergence of Korea carries even more threats : “Televisions and phones today are connected to the network and are designed with the same structure as computers, so you have to say they are potential targets”. Thus, a smartphone may become a Zombie and be included into Botnets, the vast group of infected PCs from where DDOS are launched.

The country is poorly prepared to ever growing cyberattack scale. By nature, the average customers are not inclined to spend money into expensive antivirus software. The government itself is reluctant to do so; budget for cybersecurity is 2 to 3 percents of IT-related amount.
Even financial organizations reacts only when threaten. Banks are now equipped since a cyberattack in February. It’s not the case for all others financial organizations : “Only a handful of major securities firms are equipped with systems to overcome DDoS attacks, and the rest are known to be vulnerable to such cyber terrorist attack”, leaked anonymously security firm source.

[Korea’s No.1 Anti-virus software]

Awareness is increasing . The government now engages structural plans to enable to separate local governmental network with civilian Internet if needed. The Ministry of Strategy and Finance will provide a cybersecurity center for financial and economical institutions within this year. More importantly, companies now purchase defense systems for their self protection. Sales reports record a boom for this range of products, pictured as a “flood” by an official of a security lab adding “After these attacks, DDoS blocking programs will see a rise in popularity”.

Korean situation is a warning for all countries walking toward digital age and ubiquitous society. One must prepare himself before danger is coming, not after, and the first step is self-awareness

Last Sunday, the Korean Blue House (the presidential office) publicized Ericsson’s plan to invest $1.5 billion in Korea for the R&D of LTE technology. The statement came after a meeting of Korean President Lee Myung-bak and Ericsson`s CEO Hans Vestberg in Sweden. The Blue House touted it as one of Lee`s major achievements in attracting foreign investment into the country. But it was corrected quickly by Ericsson spokesman asserting company had not such intention. Why does this happen?

[Handshake between Chairman of KCC and CEO of Ericsson]

The context is the current battle for the 4th mobile communication dominant technology. Two standards are competing: WiBro is the South Korean developed variant of mobile WiMax, while Ericsson champions 3GPP Long Term Evolution, LTE. Currently, LTE progresses globally, and Ericsson Korea said LTE would become the dominant technology in the market, accounting for 90 percent of the global market in 2014. Rival mobile WiMax will account for only 1 to 2 percent, according to Ericsson Korea.

Korean manufacturers show different positions. LG Electronics is supporting LTE while Samsung Electronics supports WiBro technology. In fact Samsung owns significant amount of original technology for WiBro and thus are not willing to develop LTE.

The government’s position is quite mixed. On the one hand, they want safeguard its homegrown WiBro in their domestic market. On the other hand, they want Korean manufactories lead global LTE market through exporting. That is why the Korean government wanted Ericsson to cooperate with Korean manufacturers to develop and export LTE devices targeting for the global market.

However, Ericsson’s position is that it would invest in Korea only if the government creates LTE opportunities in Korea.

But Korea stays adamant: “We cannot give up our homegrown technology,” said Korean Communication Commission head yesterday.

It will be interesting to watch if the Korean government’s strategy can succeed. I will follow up with this issue continuously.