Nah, it's definitely state sanctioned. As the state basically has control over everything in the country, over every kind of facility and such, it does make sense you'd have to get state approval to access the internet, and frankly you see similar in other parts of the world in just simply a very decentralized way. For example as a pharmacist you have access to medicine but you need legal approval in addition to approval from state sanctioned facilities, and this is to protect both yourself and others.

In North Korea, if you're going to be in touch with noxious elements like libs Westerners, you need to first have state sanctioned approval as there's yet to be a hazmat suit for cognitohazards.

For examples, you can have a brief trip to any reddit comment section to see what I'm talking about but you do so at your own risk. Brain bleach is just a myth and you can't really clean your mind of what you read there.