Bangtongwi Releases Report on Efforts to Prevent Distribution of Illegal Filming Materials by 84 Companies

2020 Transparency Report on the Handling of Illegal Filming Materials and Related Issues
Disclosure

[Asia Economy Reporter Cha Min-young] The Korea Communications Commission (KCC) disclosed on the 31st on its website the 2020 Transparency Reports on the Handling of Illegal Filming Materials submitted by a total of 84 companies, including major value-added telecommunications service providers and webhard operators.

Starting this year, submission of transparency reports has been made mandatory for webhard operators and value-added telecommunications service providers of a certain scale, called "Preemptive Action Obligated Operators." The criteria for these operators include companies in social networking services (SNS), communities, internet personal broadcasting, and search portals with annual sales of 1 billion KRW or more, or an average daily user count of 100,000 or more.

The transparency report system was introduced following amendments to the Telecommunications Business Act and the Information and Communications Network Act, which strengthened the obligations of value-added telecommunications service providers to delete and prevent the distribution of digital sex crime materials. The KCC also disclosed transparency reports submitted by operators online at the end of January.

This time, a total of 86 companies, including 33 webhard operators, disclosed their transparency reports. In addition to domestic operators, overseas companies such as Google and Facebook also submitted reports. The reports include ▲general efforts by each operator to prevent the distribution of illegal filming materials, ▲results of processing reports and deletion requests, and ▲matters related to the appointment of persons responsible for preventing the distribution of illegal filming materials.

Efforts by each operator to prevent the distribution of illegal filming materials were also included. These efforts include ▲AI filtering X-eye (Naver), ▲24-hour full monitoring of posts (SK Communications), ▲image filtering programs (DC Inside), ▲permanent suspension of users uploading obscene materials (AfreecaTV), ▲automatic blind upon report reception (Setizen), ▲profile photo approval system (April Seven), ▲harmful content prevention technology for live streaming (machine detection, Twitch), ▲operation of content review expert groups (Twitch), and ▲strict adult content mode applied in Korea (Microsoft).

The KCC plans to have internet operators continuously manage the handling results of illegal filming materials, considering that the amended Information and Communications Network Act provisions were enforced at the end of last year and many operators’ transparency reports do not yet include handling results of illegal filming materials.

Along with this, education will be provided for persons responsible for preventing the distribution of illegal filming materials. From December, technical and managerial measures, which will be mandatory for Preemptive Action Obligated Operators, will also be promoted.

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