Random Chatting Apps Designated as 'Harmful Media for Youth' Without Real-Name Verification and Conversation Storage Features

Ministry of Gender Equality and Family Announces Administrative Notice on Related Draft
Misused as Major Channel for Illegal Activities
Collecting Opinions Until Next Month 2
Scheduled to Be Issued in the Second Half of This Year

▲Photo of crackdown on juvenile prostitution using chat apps (Source=Ministry of Gender Equality and Family)

[Asia Economy Reporter Hyunju Lee] Applications providing online chat services between unspecified users (random chat apps) will be designated as harmful media for adolescents.

The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family announced the draft notification designating random chat apps as harmful media for adolescents on the 13th for administrative notice.

Among all app markets, there are 346 chat apps, but only 13.3% require identity verification or mobile device authentication, and 47.1% of apps do not manage subscribers as members. Random chat apps have been misused as major channels for illegal and harmful activities such as arranging meetings with minors and prostitution. Recently, digital sex crimes such as the 'Nth Room' case were also found to have lured adolescents through random chat apps.

Through this draft notification, random chat apps that fail to implement at least one technical measure such as ▲real-name verification or mobile phone authentication ▲chat saving ▲reporting functions will be designated as harmful media for adolescents and restricted to adult use only. Currently, adult video chat sites, game item trading sites, and dating agency sites are designated as harmful media for adolescents.

Simple chat services provided as an additional feature in games or acquaintance-based chat services, where contacts are stored on individual users' mobile phones rather than conversations between unspecified users, are excluded from the harmful media notification for adolescents.

This draft notification will collect opinions from various fields through administrative notice until the 2nd of next month, undergo regulatory review, and be finalized by the Youth Protection Committee, with issuance scheduled for the second half of this year.

Yoon Hyosik, Director of the Youth and Family Policy Office, said, "Random chat apps are difficult to prevent, report, and monitor due to their anonymity and the nature of leaving no evidence," adding, "We will actively work to create a safe environment for using chat services."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.