The Ministry of State Security proactively gathers information on potential threats against the political system with a focus on those of a domestic origin, particularly in the form of ideological tendencies held by individual North Koreans. The Ministry of State Security is pointedly concerned with the identification of citizens who adhere to monotheistic beliefs such as Christianity.

The Ministry of State Security became independent from the Ministry of People’s Security in 1973 following an order by Kim Il Sung that called for separating political order operations from public order operations. Its official mission is to protect the Kim family and the political system by uncovering hostile forces engaged in espionage, anti-party, or anti-revolutionary activities. As an intelligence agency, it carries out many of its operations in secret. Ministry of State Security officers do not wear a uniform in public, and individuals released from Ministry of State Security custody are made to stamp their fingerprints on a form stating that, upon release, they will not speak about their experience.

The Ministry of People’s Security is analogous to a national police force in other nations, but it serves a party-political function due to it being subject to Workers’ Party of Korea control and its mission of upholding the political system. The Ministry of People’s Security is the main entity that conducts law enforcement activities according to the criminal code. Among its articles there is no explicit reference to religion, although there are items related to damaging the socialist order and bringing foreign influence into North Korea.

Nonetheless, the ministry’s enforcement activities fall under the euphemistic term ‘superstitious activities.’ This term encompasses religious and belief practices, and commonly refers to Shamanism. The Ministry of People’s Security has had several changes of name, including in recent years. For example, it was renamed the Department of People’s Security in 2010 as part of an effort to place it alongside two other major security organs: the Department of People’s Armed Forces and the Department of State Security. It was renamed again in 2016 as the Ministry of People’s Security and placed under the State Affairs Commission. Finally, in May 2020, it was renamed the Ministry of Social Security.