Police in Pyongyang have started an emergency crackdown after discovering that high school students in the capital’s central districts made over 150 mobile payments in just six months. Authorities worry that easy access to electronic payments is having a harmful effect on teenagers and believe more education is needed.
“On June 16, city police distributed educational materials through district police departments to Socialist Patriotic Youth League and Korean Children’s Union officers at schools, warning that the spread of mobile electronic payments was having a non-socialist impact on teens,” a Daily NK source in Pyongyang said recently.
“This action was based on intensive inspections of high school students’ electronic payment habits by Pyongyang’s police and education departments.”
The numbers that worried officials
The materials revealed that in districts with many officials’ children—like Moranbong and Jung districts—students averaged 22 to 25 mobile payments per month, totaling over 150 payments in six months. Most of these transactions were at shops near their schools, markets, and video game arcades, primarily for drinks, snacks, and games.
City police concluded that some students see this kind of spending as perfectly normal, with wealthy students forming exclusive groups that negatively influence other teenagers’ values.
The materials made clear this trend had to stop: “The idea that you can do anything if you have money weakens the legacy of our patriotic martyrs’ self-reliant revolutionary spirit.”
Police officers assigned to city schools have distributed “self-surveys of teenage consumption” to each school, requiring individual school reports and group inspections during weekly struggle sessions starting in July. Through this process, authorities plan to reinforce the idea that schools are places for studying and learning, not showing off spending habits.
However, some people argue that automatically labeling everyday mobile payment use as “non-socialist” ignores reality.
According to the source, some parents say their children’s spending patterns come from curiosity and fascination with electronic payments rather than any anti-socialist tendencies.
The number of teenagers who went to banks in the city’s Jung district with their parents to open savings accounts in the first half of this year increased from last year, while total deposits rose 12% compared to the same period last year. This shows that some teenagers are actually interested in saving money and managing their finances responsibly.
“Parents say we need systems to manage independent spending within the socialist framework rather than blanket restrictions—that authorities shouldn’t just crack down on teenagers but focus on raising them through healthy education,” the source said.
A generational divide
“People say reality is changing, but only the adults are stuck in old ways of thinking,” he added. “Teenage spending through electronic payments is something to guide in the right direction, not crush. Trying to suppress everything will just make teenagers rebel.”
Within North Korea, there’s a growing belief that increased electronic payment use among teens is a natural trend showing how the socialist financial system is evolving, and that this should be accepted flexibly rather than constantly restricted.
The situation highlights a tension between traditional socialist values and the practical realities of a modernizing economy, with teenagers caught in the middle of competing visions for North Korea’s future.
