The US government on Tuesday issued a rare alert squarely blaming the North Korean government for a raft of cyber attacks stretching back to 2009 and warning that more were likely.

The joint warning from the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation said that "cyber actors of the North Korean government," referred to in the report as "Hidden Cobra," had targeted the media, aerospace and financial sectors, as well as critical infrastructure, in the United States and globally.

The new level of detail about the US government's analysis of suspected North Korean hacking activity coincides with increasing tensions between Washington and Pyongyang because of North Korea's missile tests. The alert warned that North Korea would continue to rely on cyber operations to advance its military and strategic objectives.