Ministry of Science and ICT Promotes Support for Public Stability in ICT Sector Ahead of Chuseok

Free Video Calls and Chuseok Free Movie Offerings During Holidays
Emergency Monitoring System Strengthened to Ensure Digital Service Stability

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The Ministry of Science and ICT announced the 'ICT Sector Livelihood Stability Support Plan' on the 24th as a follow-up measure to the 'Chuseok Livelihood Stability Measures (Joint by Related Ministries).' The plan aims to alleviate household burdens for Chuseok shopping and strengthen win-win cooperation with small and medium-sized partner companies to support livelihood stability.

First, free video calls and content usage will be supported during the Chuseok holiday. To enable families separated by distance to share news and affection during the holiday, the three mobile carriers will provide free video calls for six days from September 28 to October 3, including for users of budget phone services.

SK Telecom and LG Uplus will offer special free Chuseok movies available on mobile. On IPTV, KT, SK Broadband, and LG Uplus plan to run promotions offering up to 50% discounts on popular movies.

Additionally, support will be provided for youth job-seeking communication expenses, and improvements will be made to internet cancellation penalties to reduce burdens. The three carriers will waive data usage fees for youths aged 19 to 34 using job search sites during October and November to support their economic activities.

Last year, only data usage fees for five job search sites operated by the Ministry of Employment and Labor?such as Worknet, the National Employment Support System, and the Job Training Portal?were waived. Starting this year, data usage fees for five additional sites, including World Job Plus and Job Allio, will also be waived.

The structure of cancellation penalties for high-speed internet, specifically the discount refund fees, will be improved by lowering the maximum penalty amount and easing cancellation burdens in the latter part of contracts. To reduce the burden on low-income households, discount events on major Chuseok products will be held with participation from Post Office Shopping and home shopping channels.

Mobile carriers plan to pay approximately 276 billion KRW early to support the business activities of small and medium-sized partner companies before Chuseok. They will also support liquidity in distribution channels by early payment of about 260 billion KRW in commissions (SKT, KT) or low-interest loans of about 20 billion KRW (LG Uplus).

The Ministry of Science and ICT will strengthen self-monitoring of services by the three mobile carriers and digital service providers such as Naver and Kakao to ensure stable communication service usage.

For fixed-line communications, pre-inspections of communication quality and base station capacity expansions will be conducted in major crowded areas such as train stations and bus terminals, along with the operation of a 24-hour emergency response system. For digital services, traffic concentration management will be implemented to prevent interruptions in major services frequently used during holidays, such as SNS and navigation apps.

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