North Korea denies it carried out a cyber attack on a South Korean bank last month that prevented customers from accessing their accounts for three days.
South Korean prosecutors last week blamed hackers in the communist North for an April 12 attack on an agricultural cooperative known as Nonghyup, which authorities described as the worst attack on a South Korean banking network. Prosecutors said the attack bore similarities to earlier cyber-incursions linked to the North. They said the latest sabotage came from hackers who gained control of a bank sub-contractor's laptop and then operated it remotely as a so-called "zombie" computer.
Tuesday, the North Korean Defense Ministry called the accusations "absurd" and a fabrication aimed at perpetuating North-South political tensions.
Pyongyang, citing unnamed experts, said the Internet protocol (IP) addresses linked to the attack came from the United States, Japan or South Korea.
Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.