Daeseong-dong, the only civilian residential area in the South Korean half of the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas, had long been known as "an island on land" due to its isolated location.

The village is only about 400 meters from the border with North Korea, and its residents, many of whom engage in farming, had to be accompanied by soldiers whenever they needed to go to a water pump station to control the irrigation of their land.

(Supplied photo shows villagers with KT Corp. officials in front of the town center in Daeseong-dong, Paju, South Korea on June 27, 2019.)[Photo courtesy of KT Corp.]

But when a next-generation mobile network service reached the so-called Freedom Village in June, it turned into a "smart village" with "smart farms" that made the cumbersome security arrangement unnecessary.

The fifth-generation cellular network technology enables ultrafast data transfer on mobile devices and brings almost instantaneous connectivity to numerous devices.

The service only began for smartphone users in South Korea and the United States in April, with South Korea's biggest telecom carrier KT Corp. claiming to have launched the world's first nationwide commercial 5G network.

KT says it has brought the latest network technology to the otherwise isolated village of 46 households to make it a safer and more comfortable place to live.

And its decision to do so came naturally as it has been supporting the village's internet infrastructure for nearly 20 years, according to Lee Sun Joo, KT's senior vice president.

"We began providing internet service to Daeseong-dong village back in 2001, and that's how our partnership started," Lee said in late June at an event marking the launch of the 5G service.

In 1953, the three-year Korean War ended with an armistice, creating the DMZ, a 250-kilometer-long strip of land that stretches 2 km into each Korea as a buffer zone between the nations.

As a symbol of peace, one village was built in each half of the DMZ, Daeseong-dong on the southern side and Kijong-dong, or Peace Village, on the northern side.

(Supplied photo shows a student at Daeseong-dong elementary school(L) presenting his coding work, with help of his homeroom teacher(R) in Daeseong-dong, Paju, South Korea on June 27, 2019.)[Photo courtesy of KT Corp.]

The areas leading up to the DMZ on each side have been heavily fortified and are often referred to as the world's last Cold War frontier and "the scariest place on earth."

But last year, after a series of nuclear and ballistic missile tests in previous years, North Korea began a rapprochement with South Korea.

At an inter-Korean summit in September in Pyongyang, the defense authorities of the two Koreas signed an agreement to take a series of measures to ease military tensions on the divided peninsula, with a focus on the DMZ.

They agreed to stop various military drills aimed at each other along the demarcation line running in the middle of the DMZ. A total of 20 guard posts that had been built within the 4 km band were demolished.

But the settlement's roughly 200 residents still live in a state of tension as the two countries technically remain in a state of war, with the Korean War ending not with a peace treaty.

To ensure their safety, South Korean soldiers working at the Joint Security Area in the nearby Panmunjeom truce village as part of the U.S.-led U.N. Command reside in the village.

Locals going to the village's pumping station about 2 km away from their farmland used to have to be shadowed by the soldiers.

But with the 5G service came smart farm technology, which enables the pumping station's gate to be opened and closed remotely with a simple action from the village office.

(A group of fifth graders of Daeseong-dong elementary school playing Uno game during there free time in Daeseong-dong, Paju, South Korea on June 27, 2019.)

"Many of us are looking forward to seeing how this smart farm technology would make our lives much more comfortable," said village chief Kim Dong Gu.

Daeseong-dong Elementary School, the only school in the settlement, has also benefited from the arrival of the 5G network.

With the near real-time, low-latency communications offered by the 5G technology, pupils can learn with those from other schools using 5G-connected computer devices and virtual-reality equipment.

"Our school has become a 'smart school' with the help of 5G," school principal Yoon Young Hee said.

(Chae Uk, team leader at Corporate Social Responsibility team at KT Corp. stands in front of the reporters to explain how Smartfarm technology works in Daeseong-dong, Paju, South Korea, on June 27, 2019.) 

For KT, however, making 5G service available to the village was no small feat. In fact, it was "extremely difficult," a company representative acknowledged, because it required authorization from the U.N. Command, which has jurisdiction over the DMZ, as well as from South Korean government agencies that did not want network signals going beyond the border.

KT Chairman and CEO Hwang Chang Gyu said the company takes it as its responsibility to improve the living conditions of the villagers when interest in the DMZ is growing worldwide.

The DMZ hosted the first summit meeting between South Korean President Moon Jae In and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in April 2018. And in late June this year, it also played host to a meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Kim after a brief visit to a guard post near Panmunjeom.

"It's still a place where you can feel the tension with your skin, but at least the virtual space that we enjoy with 5G is as peaceful as ever," Kim Dong Gu, the village chief, said.

"Things have changed a lot these days, so I guess the reality will become as peaceful as the virtual space," he added.