No: the missile peaked at 550km (probably about when it was over Japan), so unless a(n un)lucky Japanese civilian in "sparsely populated Hokkaido" was looking toward Pyongyang through a telescope at 6am and tweeted a photo of the missile in boost phase, I'd say you wouldn't even be able to tell what the object was.

Furthermore, if you don't trust reports from two nations' militaries, you definitely shouldn't trust anything on the Internet.

Hokkaido is beautiful this time of year, just sayin'

>In today's world I'm skeptical to say the least.

Why? NK has been launching missiles for quite some time now, and this fits reasonably well with their overall pattern of escalation. I don't really pay that much attention to NK, but this launch is utterly unsurprising to me based on my very limited and amateur interest in the subject.

The flight tracking sites doesn't use radar, they use ADS-B and a network of internet connected receivers.

Certainly NK has every reason to lie, but I can't imagine why Japan would. Open war with NK would be very dangerous for them.

Not saying they are lying but Abe has been continously playing with the fear of NK to push his military agenda (the change of constitution and surveillance laws).