North Korea has set up a dedicated military team given the task of keeping The Interview away from the eyes of its citizens.
Pyongyang has been widely blamed for a crippling cyber attack on Sony Pictures in an effort to halt the release of the film, a slapstick comedy starring James Franco and Seth Rogan that portrays the killing of Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader.
Under pressure, Sony reversed an earlier decision to cancel the film and its notoriety immediately raked in $15 million in the first four days after it was made available online. More than 330 cinemas across the US also showed the film, earning Sony an additional $2.8 million in the same time frame.
The movie was also illegally downloaded an estimated 1.5 million times in the first two days after its initial release, with China and South Korea accounting for the majority of that total.
Apparently concerned that pirate DVDs of The Interview are about to flood across its borders - attached to balloons floated across the Demilitarised Zone from South Korea by dissidents and defectors, or by smugglers operating across the porous border with China - the North Korean regime has ordered a crackdown.
South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported that a three-star general from the State Security Department has been put in charge of the new unit, based in Hyesan, on the border with China.
"The regime has started cracking down on the black market, while keeping a close watch on smugglers in the border area," a source told the paper. "Officials are visiting homes and checking computers and DVD players."
Toshimitsu Shigemura, a professor at Tokyo's Waseda University and an authority on North Korean affairs, says the regime had little choice but to attempt to close North Korea's borders to the film.
"The movie is no threat to North Korea, but it is a clear danger to the ruling system," Professor Shigemura told The Telegraph. "As the leader in North Korea has absolute power, every effort must be made to save face in a situation such as this.
"There is also a threat to the Kim regime's legitimacy, which the film raises uncomfortable questions over," he added.
With the majority of North Korea's Internet sites still out of action, a cyber attack which Washington has declined to take the credit for but which the North has said is tantamount to an act of war, there have been new suggestions that North was not the source of the assault on Sony Pictures.
In an on-line exchange with the Lizard Squad printed in The Washington Post, a member of the "cyber-terrorist" group claimed a degree of responsibility for the attack and said the group provided Sony employees' log-in details to the Guardians of Peace.
Other reports seem to suggest the heack was the work of a disgruntled former Sony employee. According to the Politico website, FBI agents have been briefed by a security firm that says its research points to a fired Sony staff, not North Korea.
Sony's computer system crashed on November 25, with a final message reading "Hacked By #GOP" and a red skull appearing on employees' screens before they went dark.
The hackers also published a number of completed Sony films that were awaiting release on online downloading sites, including Annie and Still Alice.
In further messages, the hackers said The Interview is "harming the regional peace and security and violating human rights for money".
Analysts pointed out that Pyongyang had previously made nearly word-for-word claims about the film threatening regional security.
The United States said on Monday that it stands by the FBI's determination that North Korea was responsible for the attack.
(The Telegraph)
