Lee Jae-myung: "Digital Sexual Crime Victims One-Stop Support Centers Must Be Expanded Nationwide"

[Asia Economy (Suwon) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] Lee Jae-myung, Governor of Gyeonggi Province, visited the Gyeonggi Province Digital Sex Crime Victim One-Stop Support Center on the 19th and stated, "Since it is difficult to control digital sex crimes and the damage to victims is considerable, extensive countermeasures such as implementing victim support centers nationwide are necessary."

On the morning of the same day, Governor Lee visited the Gyeonggi Province Digital Sex Crime Victim One-Stop Support Center located at the Gyeonggi Human Resources Development Institute in Suwon City, encouraged the on-site workers, and had a discussion with related personnel including Jeong Jeong-ok, CEO of the Gyeonggi Women's Family Foundation, and Baek Mi-yeon, head of the Gyeonggi Province Digital Sex Crime Victim One-Stop Support Center.

At the meeting, Governor Lee said, "Although it is a risk that everyone faces, the anxiety about safety experienced by women, who can be considered socially vulnerable, is very high. Among them, I believe the damage caused by sex crimes, especially uncontrollable digital sex crimes, is quite significant," and diagnosed, "Due to the rapid spread and wide-ranging nature of digital sex crimes, which are their characteristics, the damage tends to be fatal."

He continued, "Last year, due to the Nth Room incident, we pondered this issue and created a response support team, but realizing that structural and long-term measures were necessary, we established an independent support center," and expressed gratitude to the workers, saying, "We have achieved many results in a relatively short time. This also means that many people have received relief from their damages."

He added, "However, since this is a nationwide issue but only Gyeonggi Province is handling it, I feel regretful and worried about whether the spread and damage can be controlled to some extent," and stated, "I hope the National Assembly expands discussions and, if possible, adopts and implements this as a major project on a nationwide or national level."

Governor Lee also said on the day, "We will consider assigning digital sex crime investigations to the autonomous police," and pointed out, "A national-level response is also necessary for companies that do not cooperate well with deletion requests."

He further said, "When establishing the organization (Digital Sex Crime Victim One-Stop Support Center), we thought there might be problems due to lack of investigative authority, so as an emergency measure, special judicial police were deployed, but since their duties are limited, there will likely be considerable limitations in investigations," and requested Baek Mi-yeon, the head of the support center, "Since police work related to women falls under the autonomous police duties of the province, please consider deploying general national police or autonomous police rather than special judicial police."

Regarding Baek Mi-yeon’s report that companies are not responding promptly to requests for deletion of victim videos, Governor Lee emphasized, "Delaying without reason is a deliberate criminal act," and stressed, "Punishment or sanctions for neglecting reports are absolutely necessary."

The Gyeonggi Province Digital Sex Crime Victim One-Stop Support Center was opened on February 1st as the first of its kind among local governments nationwide. It provides victim-tailored services including victim counseling, monitoring and deletion of victim videos, legal support, and medical support linkage. Additionally, investigators from the Gyeonggi Province Special Judicial Police are dispatched to support investigations into violations of related laws such as the Youth Protection Act.

The center has provided 703 counseling supports and conducted 32,597 monitoring cases through the provincial citizen response monitoring group. In April, through a social network service (SNS) survey on digital sex crime materials, a total of 506 videos and other materials found were requested for deletion on the respective SNS platforms. As a result, 402 cases were deleted.

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