>> narrator: tonight, inside the north korea the regime wants to keep hidden. >> the way the north koreanee regime k the regime going is this pervasive security apparatus and fear tactics. >> if people stop believing in the regime, that means central controis breaking down. >> narrator: with undercovere footagand exclusive interviewfrontline uncovers a new generation risking their s lives tomuggle images out and information in. >> north korean defectors havege emas very quiet agents of social progress. >> narrator: threatening kim jong un's total control of what the world sees of north korea and what north koreans see of the worl >> there really is a potential here that something quite dramatic could happen.

>> narrator: but how far will g the dictatorto hold on to power? if a government is willing to kill as many people as necessary to stay in power, it usually stays in power for a very long time. >> narrator: tonight, frontline takes you inside the "secret n state ofth korea." >>is frontl made possible by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. and by the corporation for public broadcasting. major support for frontliis provided by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant, and peaceful world. more information is available at macfound.org. additional support is provided by the park foundation, dedicated to heightening public awareness of critical issues. the john and helen glessner family trust, supporting ttrustworthy journalism t informs and inspires. and by the frontline journalism r.nd, with major support from

jon and jo ann hag and additional support from millicent bell, through the millicent and eugene bell foundation. narrator: jiro ishimaru is a whurnalist trying to exposat kim jong un's regime wants to hide: the secret world of th north korean people.

he has an undercover netmsrk which covertly filife inside e country. (translated): obviously, it's a thing to do. in north koryd, even filming ev life is considered a form of political trean. if they are caught filming, they'd be locked up and may never be let out again. narrator: even filmingden the chinese sif the border is illegal.

narratorthe people who work for jiro smuggle their footage across the tumen river, which divides china from north korea. the north korean border guards have been knowto shoot to kill. the border has become even more tightly controlled since k jong un took over as supreme leader two years ago, the third ruler in the kim dynasty after his father and grandfather. he inherited the world's most isolated country, where the people h e no internet and the state hasl on ony information coming in out. even with the tight security, jiro and his japanese news organization manage to get the footage ou

narrator: he is going to meet one of his contacts, who has made it across the border with new images from north korea. narrator: they secretly film in areas no foreigners or journalists are allowed to visit. narrator: these are picturest kim jong un doesn'want the world to see. jiro has recinited a network of ordary north koreans living

in towns across thuntry. they risk their lives to get the footage. one of his contacts is a state employee, but has been smuggling footage out for five years. he agreed to speak if his identity was concealed. (translated): this is da,erous, and if i get caug ow i'd immediately be executed as a traitor to the korean people. but i've g to do this. i've got to do this no matter what. i'm just one person. even if i have to sacrifice my life, someday, something is going to change. narrator: the famine which killed more than a million north koreans in the 199 has ended. but e united nations says th countro food sthrtages, and more than e quarters of the population don't have enough food to eat.

narrator: over the past three years, jiro's undercover netrk filmed orphaned street kids gathering in the markets begging for money and on the lookout for scraps of food. for the safety of the people filming, he disguises their voices.

narrator: very few of these orphaned chiren manage to escape north korea. but we found one who d. he asked to be identified as "lee" and agreed to speak to us if we conceled his identity. (translated): my father passed away when ias three, and then my mother left home and didn't return. i was very hungry. i was almost aouays hungry when i was. there were times when i ate a meaa day. but when i starved, i didn't eat for two days. because i was hungry, i stole and pick pockets.

i lived yke that until i was rs old. ther many others. and there were children who starveto death. (translated): did any of your friends die? (translated): yes, they did. (translated): how old were you all then? (translated): i was about 11. oo narrator: undercover ftage from last march shows a group of homeless orphans trying to stay warm in belozero temperatures.

narrator: there is an elite in the capital city pyongyang, and despite tough international sanctions, they live a ortable life with the latest luxury goods. this woman was filmed getting into newly imported mercedes on her wding day. north korean state tv makes the country out to be a land of plenty. they show pictures of an advanced economy, happy, well-fed children, anth shops overflowing wioods.

pyongyang's department store no. 1 is stocked with imported products from around the world. but as jiro's footage shows, many of the ems are not for sale. narrator: the department store is regularly featured on state tv, which tells its people they live in the best country on earth. one of the regime's senior propagandists defected

and is now living in the south. (translated): as well as a physical dictatorship, they oppress people with an emotional dictatorship. in north korea, they promote the leader to be the sun. if you go too close, you burn. if you go too far, you freeze to death. you think of him as incredibly god-like. we thought he didn't even go to the toilet. narrator: nopeh koreans can't escahe omnipresent propaganda. kim jong un's speeches are pumped from speakers on strt corners. (speech playing) na ator: this one was on strt corners. on a loop for three months, promising his pele a bright economic future.

(music playing) narrator: since the north and thsouth split in the late 1940s, hatred of america has been central to north korean indoctrination. this government video shows a north korean dreaming of new york city being destroyed by a missile attack. thliaverage north korean eves a significant part of the anti-american propaganda. they believe that americans are ready to invade. they believe that america is a threat. they believe that americans started the korean w in order to enslave or maybe commit large-scale genocide in korea. they believe it. not all, but a majority. narrator: in pyongyang, state tv news is broadcast

on public squares, warning of imminent war with america. (children singing) narrator: once a week, whole villages are required to attend meetingsfying the leader. (children singing) narrator: the regime demands displays of total loyalty. if you don't attend these weekly meetings, you could come under suspicion. way the north korean regime keeps the regime going, one of the reasons is fear tactics. ,narrator: in north korea it's not only the person

who commits the crime that is punished. often, their whole family will be arrested for "guilt by association." it's up to three generations. when the senior-most north korean defector hwang jang yop de cted, his relatives wereunded ud were sent to pson camps. these guys didn't even know they were related to hwang jang yop when the security guys came knocking on their door they said, "i'm related to hwang?" itlike, a ninth cousin. this is how north korea operates. narrator: recent satellite imagery analyzed by amnesty international shows thato ince kim jong un camewer, the political prison 200,000 civilians who are outside of the criminal penal system. one of the camps, hwasong,te is 540 square kilo, three times the size of washington, d.c. narrator: it's estimated that as many as one in 100 north koreans is a pical prisoner, many of whom were caught trying

to defect. stil several thousand northreans trh china each year. idlee, the former street k fled when he was 18. (translated): i was very scared, but i thought, "it's better to die than live like an insect." before i left, i prefored a little bit of . i roasted some beans. i ate little bits of that as i went on my way. i o the top of the mountains to see where the gu then at night, i crossed the river when nobody was watching. i crossed the river alone and made it into china.

i usedcthe sun to get my direns and went inland. narrator: ctors like lee risk getting caught and sent back by china, north kores closest ally. but lee says he met a broker who smuggled h 2,000 miles to the south korean embassy in thailand. he was granted asylum and flew to seoul, where he has lived for the last two years. he still hides his identity because he's afraid of north korean agents discovering him. (translated): i graduated from high school in february this year. i'm currently looknog for a job, t working yet. although i live st south korea now, it l troubles me to think about the north koret children who suffer ere

like i used to. (translatea : north korea is ciety that has fallen ill. it's a diseased soreety that needs to be our footage is forcing north korea to acknowledge the hardships that their people face. the t thorities don't likeat all. becaif the truth gets out, it would put kim jong un's power under threat. narrator: jiro ishimaru smuggles footage out of the country, but there is nfso a steady flow of imation back in. jeong g-il is a defector living in seoul who smuggles foreign films and tv shows into north korea. ef(translated): the men pr watching action films.

men love their action films! i sent them skyfall recently the women enjoy watching soap operas and dramas. they like that k film. now they're sharing thumb drives a lot. even officials have one or two thumb drives. north korea is trying to hunt them down because ththing that changes people's mindsets is popular culture. it probably has the most important role in bringing about democracy in north korea. rrator: jeong and his partner, also a defector, are on their way to the chinese border to smuggle in laptops, radios, usbs and dvds. (trad): of course there's a risk. but i want to send them in, i just do it. in north korea, rumor has it there are 100 people that e

desperate toet their hands on me. but they don't know when i go, do they? narrator: they a filming their trip with a hidden camera. narrator: posing as mushroom deporters, they bribed a br guard to let them across. narrator: the borduard isn't where he said he'd be, so they call him.

narrator: the guard says he can't get them across, so they decide to wait until night.

before defecting, jeong used to cross the border illegally as a smuggler until he was caught and accused of being a spy. he was taken to a notorious political prison camp, yodok. (translated): when i arrived at the prison camp, it was april 6, 2000. it was awful when i wentnside. that day, they completely beat the hell out of me. they'd p a wooden stick behindyour kneet down, like this. if they pushed down on you, you'd collapse and then u'd hear your kneecaps cracking. i got beaten up and tortured for about nine months. fore i got arrested, i weighed 165 pounds.

after ten months, i had a physical. when i looked at what i weighed, i was 79 pounds. i couldn't endure it any more. narrator: after three years in yodok, he says the authorities ined he wasn't a spy and let him out. a year later, heted, and has been working against the regime ever since. tonight, he'r.going back to the bor narrator: jeong waits on the chinese side of the tumen river

for his north korean smuggler. they find eachcither by sparking theirette lighters.

narrator: the dvds and thumbdrives make their way to markets across the country, filled with goods illegally smuggled from china.

onrrator: within days, s smuggler delivers some of his thumbdrivesgind dvds to two teenags and films them watching. er(music playing on comput)

narrator: it's been reported that almost half of the north koreans who defect had watched foreign television even though it's illegal. information and knowledge of the outside world ou is beginning to widen there's far more inner penetration of north korean society today than before. if north korean people themselves stop believing in the regime and the story they tell themselves, that means central control is breaking down in some ways. narrator: kim jong un has reportedly been sending his security forces house to house, searching for illegal dvds, and last nember ordered the execution of as many as 80 people, some watching foreign television.

narrator: open radio for north korea is a station staffed by defectors transmitting stories into the country from across the border in the south. (translated): what the north korean regime fears the most is information about the outside world going into the count.

we tell the north korean people how vicious their ctatorship is. if someone listens to these broadcasts and passes the story on o other people, and if tstory ia ry serious matter. in these cases, i understand that some even face public execution. narrate story they are broadcasting today-- that kim jong un's wife, a former pop star, recorded a pornographic video-- is quickly spreading around north korea and has prov the station reports that the singer of the popular song "horse lady" and other performers in this video have ti been executed for star the rumor. (translated): because north koreans are so cut off, they're incred ly curious, and we'vefound thatk

of listening to these broadcasts. narrator: open radio says that almost a million north koreans rel larly listen to illereign radio. (translated): the more i listened to the radio, the more i thought what we've learned isn't true. i've boled. and this made me want to become free. s narrator: chanyang i. she lives in seoul but grew up in a remote region of north korea.

narrator: her father bought the family a radio, which he modified to pick up foreign stations. (translated): my father was preparing to come here since was nine years old. ving constantly in fear like that was really difficult. if we got caught, th twhole family would gaken away. i was exhausted by it all so i asked my father, "even if it's north korea, can't we just live safely?" but he said, "no. i want your generation to learn freely." narrator: when chanyang was , her family decided to defect. to avoid raiftng suspicion, they le at different times. she was the last to leave. (translated): i was always being watched. the people watching weren't just from the government. e the people who werwatching me were my friends and neighbors.

i knew all of this, but had to act as if i didn't. s narrator: after two ye laying low, chanyang escaped through china and reunited with her family in seoul. (translated): my brother and sister had grown up so much when i saw themd and their accents haall changed too. but we were all back together again, in a circle. we're a family of five. we were all juhappy that we didn't even need to say a word. the first thing we did was just eat together. narrator: chanyang now appears on a weekly tv show with other ctors called on my way to meet you.

here is my name and where i'm born. narrator: it's bst in south korea, but is a popular show smuggled back into the north. (translated): my friends back home watch it, and all the childrenf the party officials in north korea watch it and say they will defect. we're going to talk about that today. when my friendeysee me on the show, 'll fantasize about south korea. they'll say i've changed a lot. in north korea i never smiled. narrator: the show is part current affairs... part talent show...

part beauty t. north korean defectors have emerged as very quiet agents of social progress in north korea, because people often assume that they just leave north korea and that's it. and at this poere you have over 20,000 north korean refugees that have resettled in south korea, that's a significant population that are joining forces to reconnect with their families back inside. and when they see that one of them can leave the community, go to south korea, that's a huge wake-up for them that shows just how much more advanced and how much more open south korea is. narrator: jeong is back in seoul, meeting with a group of

defectors who are plotting against the north korean regime. narrator: yong hee and her husband jeong oh have found another way to penetrate kim jong un's secret state. narrator: like jeong, yong hee says she suffered at the ea hands of the north k regime. her brother was caught trying to defect and she was punished.

she says she was lup and tortured by security agents. narrator: she says the officers tied her brother's hands to theagack of a truck and drd him along a dirt road as an example to others.

narrator: yong hee escaped with her husband and son, leaving her brother and mother behind. (train whistle blowing)

(explosion) ll sharp new warning of aut war. for the first time, the mysterious and secretive nation... there is nothing imminent, but these threatening statements have everyone on edge. are we on the brink of a nuear war? narrator: last spring, north korea became the first country since the cold war to threaten the united states mainland with a nuclear attack.

when watching this i thought, wow, even from north korean standards, this is really over the top. they always do this cycle of provocation. it's just the intensity of the recent provocaon was even greater. i don't think anybody really believed the north koreans were goto launch a nuclear missile at the united states. but the basic question that rose, "does this guy know where the red line is? does he know when the bluster should stop or is he really gonna do something stupid?" this fellow may not know what is real and what is a video game. (men singing militaristic song) narrator: western intelligence agencies were concerned becausutthey knew so little ahe young leader. it's really sad but when kim jong un first became known, the cia hais one picture of an 11-year-old boy with that

bratty grin. and that's what we were working with. that's the photo that we had. and what we knew about it was already in the new york times. it wasn't really much more than that. narrator: kim jong un was brought up by his mother, opera singer ko young-ne of kim jong il's four wives. he spent three years in a scho a in switzerland, posithe son of a diplomat. at the age of 18, he was called back to pyongyang, where he was secretly groomed to become leader. state media had never shown kim jong un or mentioned him by name until the year before his father's death in december 2011. he was then unveiled to the north korean public in this state-produced documentary.

narrator: kim jong un succeeded hifather and grandfather to become the new leader of north korea. in north korea, reverence for age, experience. these things matter. and now you are sort of parading around this 29-year-old guy who did noliserve a day in the miry. i doubt that people genuinely have the kd of feeling towards kim jong un as they did for kim jong il. (translated): we would say, how can this boy who's still wet behind the ears be in power? but the north korean government spread these rumors that althe was young, he was very wise.

tht's what the government k saying. narrator: jiro's undercovell footage shows peoplever the country being forced to prove their dedication to the new leader, but some resenting having to it. these soldiers were ordered to build a railroad from kim jong un's birthplace to pyongyang to mark him coming to power. narrator: the undercover footage even sho a local official criticizing k jong un's successio

narrator: to compensate for his lack of experience, the regime made parallels with his grandfather kim il sung, who is still wi worshipped and is officially eternal president of north korea. there are all kinds of rumors that kim jong un even had cosmetic surgery to look like his grandfather. but certainly his style seems to be more like kim il sung as well. trying to be a reincarnation of his grandfather is actually smar a way because his grandfather is remembered by a lot of north koreans as a much more benevolent leader than his father. om it's pr style at the mt, according to the defectors that

i've spoken with who have left the country fairly recently. the economy has not improved under kim jong un. narrator: the problem for kim jong un is that north koreans' expectations are changing. (translated): because more information is flowing in, it's getting very difficult to make people obey. there are very few people left who blindly obey every command that comes from on high. narrator: behind closed doors, even members of the north korean elite have voiced unhappiness with the regime. ke this businesswoman filmed at a private lunch.

narrator: the cynicism about their leaders comes partly from radical change in the way people make a living. (translated): looking at footage shot inside north korea, we can see that a huge number of people have started doing business with ther. this used to be illegal, and anyone caught buying or selling for personal gain was severely punished. narrator: illetol markets first bega appear when the

state became uto feed its people during the famine. today the state tolerates them, but people are pushing the limits of private enterprise. this woman is running an illegal private bus rvice. an army officer tries to stop her from picki up passengers. (translated): people's willingness to conont or ignore authority has become more and more common. people arothe world have this image of north koreans as

being brainwashed, but that's very mistaken. often now when north koreans are challenged for infringing a certain law, as long as the offense is not polical, they don't hesitate to protest if they believe the law to be irrational narrator: until recently it was ille l for women to wear pants. soldiers are arguing with this woman code. narrthe soldiers put an armband on her to mark her offense. na ator: but before long,she rips r officer steps in.

narrator: five years ago, cell phones arrived in north korea. the undercover footage shows dozens of people lining upo buy sim cards. lse phones can only make c inside north korea, but they can be modified to call outside the ou country, a very sericrime. there is an awareness and ability r the population to be modified to call outside the ou country, a very sericrime. communicate inneously that was never there before. nortrea went from zero to one million cell phone registrations in three years. but to get from one million to two million, it only took one year. and probably, to get from two million to three million will only take six months.

that concrete wall that has been there for 60 years or so will become more porous. these changes cannot be stopped. marketization, information flows... all of tse kind of trends lead to a transformation one way or anotr of north korea. the systems it stands is just unsustainable. kim jong un faces the dictator's dilemma, which is they need to open up to survive, but the process of opening up could leadreo the collapse of thme-- not the state, but of the regime. and so this is a d that he faces, it's one his father faced, it's one his grandfather faced. narrator: this dilemma he led to a power strugat the rn very top of the govent, according to the regime's former propagan. (translated): in the plit, there weren't hardrs and

reformer there was only party loyalty. today, however, rival factions have fmed. the fact a split exists shows he hasn't got a stable leadership like h father. so the only way for kim jong un to hold on to power is through a reign of terror. narrator: kim jong un came to power surrounded by his father's generals. since then he has purged almost half of the top military. in december 2013, his uncle, jang song thaek, an advocate for reform who'd served at the top of the government for 30 years, was forcibly removed from a party meeting. a week later, he was executed.

if a government is willing to sall as many people as nec to stay in power, it usually stays in per for a very long time. there are many people who are nohappy. there are many people who, in the privacy of their bedrooms, sometimes say something very, very subversive to their wives and most trusted fends. but no networks and no activities yet, because the government is brutal. even if, let's say, the public's more aware of the outside world, is that going to necessarily lead them to have a revolution? several pe cannot even get together to even talk about it. in with what's happening he middle east, there's twitter, e's facebook, people can get mobilized, they can get togee er. y the korean system is set up right now, they don't have any kind of mechanism to do that.

but i think in the case of north korea, there are credible pieces that you can put together and say, "there really is a potential here that somethingap quite dramatic could hn." no one could predict the collapse of the soviet union, no one could predict tharab spring. afterwards, everybody said it was obvious. (translated): it's not easy to predict when the regime will fall. however, the foundations of inange in north korea are laid. north koreans have undergone a huge shift in their collective mindset. k change will come.

>> for over 3 years, with extraordinary access frontline filmed prisoners in solitary. and what happened when they get out. >> ultimately, i ended up shooti somebody and coming back. >> a revealing investigation f an institution trying to change. >> you could have them do their whole time in segregation. t but i don'nt him living next to me when we release him. >> "last days of solitary" >> go to pbs.org/frontline for more on kim jong un, iluding exclusive childhood photos and interviews with those who kn him. find out how life has changed for ordinary northoreans. plus, what are the

possibilities for reform in north rea? >> the system as it stands is just unsustainable. >> connect to the frontline community on facebook and twitter or pbs.org/frontline. >> frontlinis made possiblens by contributo your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. and by the corporation for public broadcastin major support for frontliis provided by thjohn d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation, committed to anbuilding a more just, ve and peaceful world. more information is available at macfound.org. additional support is provided by the park foundation, dedicated to heightening public awareness of critical issues. rthe john and helen gless family trust, supporting trustworthy journalism that informs and inspires. and by the frontline journalism fund, th major support from jon and jo ann hagler. and additional support from millicent bell, through the

millicent and eugene bell foundation. captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> for more on this and other frontline programs, visit our webse at pbs.org/frontline. in frons "secret state of north korea" is available on dvd. to order, visit shoppbs.org or call 1-800-playpbs. frontlineis also available for download on itunes.

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(upbeat music) ♪ yo especially for those who don't know where to look. but for eddie huang, a celebrat restaurateur, author, and hit tv personality, success found him while he was pushing his unabashed perspective on anyone who would listen. - americ the greatest experiment. we all have this excellent opportunity. w what are we going to do with it? - [carlos] but how did the son of immigrants fight his way through life on his own terms and make his voice heard in the crowded world of pop culture? (eddie shouting) and what was the driving force that set him g?on the path to breaking - [carlos] what makes people successful? what are the unexpected turns in life at propel people to greatness? i'm carlos watson, editor of ozy.