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Radio Jamming on the Korean Peninsular

Radio jamming on the Korean Peninsula makes the border region one of the world's most crowded concentrations of radio signals. AM Broadcast Band (medium wave) jamming is frequent in the area surrounding Seoul and the DMZ.

The South Korean government constantly jams most radio broadcasts from North Korea on medium-wave. According to the National Security Act in South Korea, it is illegal to tune into or publish frequencies of North Korean broadcasts. South Korean citizens are typically not punished for merely listening to those broadcasts in private. However, public listening and distribution of recordings of an anti-government organization, namely North Korea, are serious criminal offenses.

North Korea jams South Korean state broadcasts, and any foreign shortwave broadcast stations which it believes operates with the intention to destabilize the regime. These include the Korean language service of the Voice of America, Free North Korea Radio (originating from US transmitters in Guam), Radio Free Asia, and several other services and broadcasts.

South Korean Radio Jamming

While it’s well documented that North Korean jamming restricts the flow of information from the outside world to its people, less frequently discussed is South Korea’s efforts to keep its citizens from having unrestricted access to media from North Korea.

South Korean National Security Law forbids citizens from listening to North Korean radio programs in their homes if the government determines that the action endangers national security or the basic order of democracy. The South Korean government constantly jams most radio broadcasts from North Korea on medium wave and a limited selection of shortwave frequencies and FM frequencies. A network of jamming transmitters in Seoul and the surrounding areas operate on the same frequencies as the North Korean radio broadcasts and blast warbling or chugging jamming sounds in an attempt to prevent their citizens from hearing radio broadcasts from the North. The jamming effectively prevents casual listeners from receiving the medium-wave North Korean programs however shortwave reception of the programming is easily achieved without any jamming interference across South Korea.

657 kHz in Seoul

South Korean jamming is heard on 657 kHz in the AM Broadcast Band in Seoul.
 The jamming signal obliterates the broadcast from North Korea’s Pyongyang Pangsong which transmits on this frequency from Kangnam, North Korea.

Listening to this same frequency in Tokyo Japan, the powerful 1500 kW signal from Kangnam is well received. The South Korean jammers that are deployed to block the programming from listeners in South Korea can be faintly heard in the background of the stronger North Korean signal.