왜 미국의 스파이 조직은 북한에 대한 정보 수집이 어려운것일까? - 이해간다.

왜 미국의 정보기관과 군사정보당국은 북한( North Korea?)으로 부터 정보를 수집하는데 한계를 느끼게 되는 것일까?

그이유를, 현역 또는 은퇴한 정보수집 담당자들의 설명에 따르면, 북한은 정보수집을 하는데는 정말로 어려움이 많다. 상상할수 없을 정도로 모든 사람들의 움직임이 감시되며, 인터넷 사용은 소수의 이용자에게만 허용되고, 국토의 대부분이 산악지대로 덮혀있고, 그속에 비밀의 턴넬을 뚫어 활동하고 있기 때문이라고 한탄한다.

미국이 해당국가로 부터 정보를 수집하는 방법은 크게 3가지로 분류된다.  심어놓은 스파이로 부터 얻는 방법이 있고, 통신교신을 도청해서 얻는 방법과, 인공위성을 통해서 지상에서 벌어지고 있는 상황을 파악하는 등, 3가지의 수집 방법이 동원돼고 있다.  이러한 3가지 정보수집 방법이 북한( North Korea )의 정보를 수집하는데는 많은 문제점이 되고 있기 때문이다.

자세한 내용은 아래 해당 기사를 읽으면 이해할수 있을것 같다.

The following story was originally published on Aug. 30, before North Korea claimed to have successfully tested a hydrogen bomb designed for an intercontinental ballistic missile. 

WASHINGTON — When North Korea launched a ballistic missile over Japan Monday, the $80 billion American intelligence-gathering apparatus had only hours of warning, U.S. officials told NBC News. 

It was the latest in a long history of apparent surprises by the rogue regime. Lately, the North Koreans have outpaced U.S. estimates in their progress on nuclear missiles. In December 2011, the U.S. was unaware for more than 50 hours that longtime leader Kim Jong Il had died — learning the news only after it was announced on North Korean TV. In 2010, the North Koreans showed an American expert a huge new uranium enrichment plant about which the world had known nothing. 

Why can't the U.S. military and intelligence agencies do a better job of ferreting out secrets from North Korea?

Because, current and former intelligence officials say, North Korea is the ultimate nightmare of an intelligence target: A brutal police state with limited internet usage occupying mountainous terrain that lends itself to secret tunnels. 

"It is one of the hardest, if not the hardest, collection nation that we have to collect against," said Daniel Coats, the director of national intelligence, to Congress in May. 

Related: North Korea Crisis: How Events Have Unfolded Under Trump

And it’s getting harder. U.S. officials told NBC News that North Korea has taken steps in recent months to disguise their missile-related activities, including fueling rockets inside structures, outside of aerial view. 

There are three basic ways the U.S. gathers most of its foreign intelligence: collecting information from human spies; intercepting electronic communications; and observing what's happening on the ground, mainly with satellites. 

All of those things are hugely problematic when it comes to North Korea.

The people problem. North Korea is one of the world's most starkly authoritarian countries, a place where criticizing the Supreme Leader can land one's whole family in a concentration camp. Russia and China are "an open book" compared to North Korea, said Bruce Klingner, a former CIA analyst now at the Heritage Foundation. 

There is no U.S. embassy in North Korea and no American business community. So it's not like the CIA can send one of its own case officers in to start gathering information. But even the South Koreans have trouble running agents in the North, Klingner said. The dialect is different and "if you're trying to get access to highly classified things, you're immediately suspicious." 

The internet problem. The National Security Agency, which hacks computers and intercepts email, has had some success pulling bits and bytes out of North Korea, former officials say, but North Korea is much less forgiving than most of its targets. That's because most of the country is not connected to the internet and few people have cellphones. To the extent that the regime communicates electronically, it has made increasing use of encryption, experts say. 

"If you look at that satellite picture [of Asia] of the lights at night from the satellite, there is one dark area with no lights on, and that is North Korea," Coats told Congress. "Their broadband is extremely limited. So using that as an access to collection — we get very limited results."

The imagery problem. Much of what the U.S. knows about North Korean military and nuclear activity it learns from satellites observing what is happening below. The official name for that is "Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance," shorthanded as ISR. North Korean officials know that, which is why they have built one of the world's most sophisticated array of tunnels to hide their stuff. They are aided by their mountainous terrain, which makes overhead observation more difficult. It is easier to spot and assess activity over an expanse of plains. 

Related: North Korea Fires 'Unidentified Ballistic Missile' Through Japanese Airspace

"They can store these launchers and missiles in tunnels and move them at night, then set them up with a tent over it," said David Albright, a nuclear weapons expert and founder of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security. 

"We do not have consistent ISR capabilities," Coats told Congress. "And so there are gaps. The North Koreans know about these."

http://nbcnews.to/2xKkHoW