I can't speak for the general public but my own impression of the country is that its nuclear weapons and isolation make it incredibly dangerous, and the problem is only getting worse as their arsenal increases.

Plus they have pulled off a number of hacks that became mainstream news so I would expect plenty of people to think that North Korea has competent software developers.

So what IS the threat from North Korea to Americans or anyone not sharing a border with them exactly? They won't launch nukes at anything outside their own borders unless Kim wants his country turned into a smoldering crater. The only real threat anyone should worry about is cyber attacks, which could be an issue if targeted at infrastructure, but not something i stay awake at night worrying about.

I find it interesting that 2 years ago people like you would be moaning about how COVID-19 is being used to "scare" people, and we should ignore US "propaganda" about death rates in the US and worldwide. But now apparently North Korea IS a threat and we should all be scared of Kim starting a nuclear war.

The last couple of years drove a lot of people to conspiracy theory channels, and it's affects are starting to show.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37421831.

those things aren't mutually exclusive. North Korea is a malnourished country, evidenced by the pretty stark fact that South Koreans are now so much taller that South Korean women are approaching the height of North Korean men.

It's just that if you pump a quarter of your entire GDP into nukes and hackers you can still be decent at it even if your people are starving.

A few years ago during the 2016 Democratic primaries, Bernie Sanders was roundly mocked by mainstream media for saying NK was a top threat due to their disengagement from the international processes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M4CoEodUTI