Rapid Increase in Harmful Information for Adolescents... Expanded Inspections on Drugs, Gambling, and More

Number of Harmful Information Deletion Requests Increased 2.6 Times This Year

Government Seoul Office, Ministry of Gender Equality and Family / Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

[Asia Economy Reporter Han Jinju] The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family is expanding its inspection of harmful online information for youth, including drugs and illegal internet gambling.

On the 4th, the Ministry announced that through the Youth Harmful Media Inspection Team, it will conduct inspections on illegal information such as narcotics, illegal internet gambling, illegal finance (proxy deposits), obscene content, prostitution, and suicide-inducing information.

The inspection team will also simultaneously check various harmful youth information, including the distribution and promotion of sex toys designated as harmful youth items, proxy purchase information for alcohol and cigarettes targeting youth, and recruitment and promotion of youth harmful businesses.

Recently, the number of youths accessing information about drugs or illegal internet gambling has been increasing. According to the Health Insurance Review & Assessment Service, the number of teenage drug offenders rose from 119 in 2017 to 450 last year, and the number of teenage gambling addiction patients increased from 39 to 127.

Since June last year, the Ministry has deployed 100 full-time inspectors to the Youth Harmful Media Inspection Team to conduct inspections on harmful youth information. Last year, they requested the deletion of 306,769 cases of harmful youth information posted on chat apps, SNS, internet broadcasts, etc., and as of November this year, they have requested the deletion of 790,885 cases, increasing inspection performance by 2.6 times.

The Ministry requests online platform operators to take voluntary measures such as deletion, blocking, adult verification, and harmful youth labeling for detected harmful youth information. Legal violations are subject to deletion and prosecution actions in cooperation with related organizations such as the Korea Communications Standards Commission and the police.

Additionally, Deputy Minister Lee Gi-soon will visit the Youth Media Environment Protection Center (located in Gangseo-gu, Seoul) on the 5th to assess the current status of harmful youth information and listen to field opinions.

Deputy Minister Lee said, "There is great social concern as youths can easily access addictive crimes such as drugs and gambling online. The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family will cooperate with online platform operators and related agencies to promptly and actively block harmful youth information and create a healthy growth environment for youth."

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