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The control of information and people's lives in North Korea is incomparably more than the examples you gave. Respectfully, your comparisons are not close.

The difference is not merely quantitative.

North Korea's activity is well documented and overwhelming.

If you want independent corroboration, sources here -- http://joshuaspodek.com/north-korea-bibliography, particularly in the human rights sections -- are a good place to start.

The FUD would be a lot easier to refute if NK would actually let people into and (especially) out of their country without a security apparatus monitoring their every move.

The problem with your argument is that in the West, we immediately knew about those issues. You just can't compare those two things.