KT tests 5G network, IoT in DMZ village
PAJU, Gyeonggi Province — Daeseong-dong, a small village located on the South Korean side of the DMZ, has been transformed into a high-tech town on the back of KT’s fifth-generation (5G) networks and other advanced information and communications technologies such as internet of things (IoT).
The highly restricted village that is under the control of the United Nations Command (UNC) was open to journalists from 10 countries, Monday, after KT began providing various 5G-based ICT services there at the end of June in a bid to improve the lives of residents who sometimes experience inconvenience due to a lack of basic services.
To offer those services, KT has set up two 5G base stations at the village after obtaining permission from the UNC and the National Intelligence Service as well as the Ministry of Science and ICT.
At the auditorium of the elementary school there, five students in the sixth grade were playing a ball game during the physical education class that utilized mixed reality (MR) sport education programs.
MR is combination of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), and enables students to engage in games indoors.
Teacher Lee Jong-won said it was difficult in the past to do the physical education class, which requires outdoor activities, when it rained or when an emergency occurred related to inter-Korean relations, as the village is only 400 meters away from the Military Demarcation Line.
“The MR program is very useful when it is difficult to do outdoor activities,” he said. “In addition, students can learn and have fun at the same time.”
In the classroom, four students in fifth grade were receiving a computer coding lesson and making robots, utilizing KT’s artificial intelligence (AI) kit.
Student Hong Ji-seong gave a presentation, explaining a “kitchen recipe robot” he created, which gives recipes when a user says the name of a food.
“I decided to make this robot when I saw my mom meet with some difficulties when she cooks,” Hong said.
Besides students, farmers at the village have also enjoyed the conveniences of the cutting-edge technology as high-tech smart farming has been applied to the town.
KT’s smart farming systems are designed to introduce innovative ways of cultivating vegetables, such as white radishes, cabbages, onions and peppers.
The service helps maintain optimal conditions to cultivate vegetables as an AI-based analytics system analyzes information such as temperature and humidity, collected by sensors installed at farms.
The service also enables farmers to remotely control water supply through sprinklers using their smartphones.