Gyeongnam Province Finds and Requests Deletion or Non-Disclosure of 2,618 COVID Stigma Information Cases

Gyeongnam Internet Quarantine Team Discloses Confirmed Cases' Movement to Prevent Secondary Damage to Small Businesses
303 Sites and Over 2,600 Facilities' Names Deleted or Made Private

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Park Saeyan] It has been revealed that the activities of the 'Gyeongnam Province Internet Quarantine Team,' formed under the special directive of Governor Kim Kyung-soo of Gyeongnam Province to prevent secondary damage to small business owners caused by the disclosure of COVID-19 confirmed patients' movement paths, are proving highly effective.

According to Gyeongnam Province on the 13th, since the 4th of last month, the Gyeongnam Province Internet Quarantine Team has been operating with the role of finding and deleting information on confirmed patients' movement paths that involve privacy violations unrelated to COVID-19 infection prevention and information whose disclosure period has expired on the internet.

Composed of 8 members in 3 teams, the Internet Quarantine Team has been deleting or correcting names of businesses or institutions left on the internet or personal information if it remains 14 days after the last visit of a confirmed patient, based on the movement paths of confirmed patients within the province, including restaurants, public institutions, and facilities, for over a month.

By the end of last month, they checked 2,624 internet sites related to 545 confirmed patients' movement paths. Among these, data on facilities such as commercial establishments, medical institutions, and religious facilities from 170 sites totaling 733 cases have been deleted. Data on facilities from 133 sites totaling 1,885 cases are currently undergoing non-disclosure processing.

Additionally, 122 sites that cannot be modified due to lack of contactable email addresses or phone numbers and those that have not been corrected despite multiple modification requests will have deletion and non-disclosure measures strengthened and promoted jointly with the Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA).

Furthermore, deletion or correction requests have been made to operators of 2,199 sites including public institutions. In this Internet Quarantine Team activity, Uiryeong-gun was the only area in the province with no facilities subject to information deletion.

Kang Seung-je, head of the Gyeongnam Province Internet Quarantine Team, said, "The Internet Quarantine Team will do its best to prevent secondary damage caused by COVID-19," and added, "We hope that the damage to residents caused by COVID-19 will be restored as soon as possible so that they can focus on their daily lives."

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