fale@machine:~$ tcptraceroute -f 128 -m 128 thepiratebay.se Selected device venet0, address 5.9.249.8, port 40771 for outgoing packets Tracing the path to thepiratebay.se (194.71.107.15) on TCP port 80 (www), 128 hops max 128 thepiratebay.org (194.71.107.15) [open] 51.673 ms 49.002 ms 47.187 ms

That server is in Germany, no way it's possible to have 50ms to NK. Also traditional traceroute has 500ms+ RTT.

They are faking/spoofing the ICMP responses. They are also prepending their route advertisement with corresponding AS paths to further disguise it.

From TeliaSonera looking glass http://lg.telia.net/

194.71.107.0/24 *[BGP/170] 02:10:36, MED 0, localpref 150, from 80.91.255.255 AS path: 2914 39138 22351 131279 51040 I

AS39138 is probably the real upstream provider of TBP. They peer with AS51040(TPB network) and TPB router prepends AS22351(Intelsat) and AS131279(North Korean ISP) into it's AS Path before advertising it to AS39138.