Subscription estimates to mobile networks are currently at 20% of the total population using smart phones (what other phones are there these days?) with about 50-80% total network coverage of the country in 3G.

https://www.38north.org/2022/11/twenty-years-of-mobile-communications-in-north-korea/

This person probably imagines that only a few thousand mega elites have phones and everyone else is starving.