[Invest&Law] Webtoon Illegal Distribution Facing Court... Market Size Exceeds 720 Billion Won

Webtoon Illegal Distribution Ajitoon Operator Sentenced to 2 Years in Prison
"An Atmosphere Must Be Created That Copyright Infringement Leads to Punishment"

Yonhap News

Legal sanctions are being strengthened, including prison sentences for operators of illegal distribution sites for webtoons and web novels. As the popularity of webtoons rises, the scale of the illegal market is also growing, but the level of punishment is still considered insufficient. There is a growing call for the active use of compensation systems alongside penalties to raise awareness about copyright infringement.

According to the legal community on the 17th, Judge Ko Young-sik of the Daejeon District Court Criminal Division 9 recently sentenced operator A of the illegal webtoon and web novel distribution sites 'Ajitoon' and 'Ajitoon Novel' to two years in prison on charges of violating copyright law. A fine of approximately 71.49 million KRW was also ordered.

A is accused of conspiring with an unidentified accomplice residing in China from April 2021 to July this year to illegally copy and distribute popular domestic webtoons and web novels. To evade investigation, he frequently changed domains and continued his activities by opening successive illegal sites. Investigations revealed that A infringed on webtoon copyrights about 750,000 times and web novel copyrights about 2.51 million times. The number of illegal postings reached 11,654 webtoons and 15,515 web novels.

Additionally, B, who operated sites such as 'OK Toon', 'Nunu TV', and 'TV Wiki' that illegally shared webtoon and online video service (OTT) content, was also brought to trial while in custody. B is suspected of continuing operations by hosting servers overseas and evading government crackdowns by changing domains, as well as collecting and sharing content without authorization from platforms like Naver Webtoon using others' accounts.

Although judicial actions against illegal webtoon distribution continue, many still regard them as merely a drop in the bucket. According to the '2024 Copyright Protection Annual Report,' the percentage of users who experienced illegal webtoon copies increased from 13.8% in 2022 to 15.4% in 2023. Illegal site distribution accounts for the largest share, with usage rates rising from 20.2% to 41.3% during the same period, an increase of 21.1 percentage points.

The estimated size of the illegal webtoon distribution market was 842.7 billion KRW in 2021 and 721.5 billion KRW in 2022. Since these statistics only cover illegal distribution in the Korean language, the damage is expected to be much greater when including illegal distribution targeting users in other language regions as webtoons grow into a global industry.

To reduce damage caused by illegal distribution, webtoon companies are developing their own countermeasures. Naver Webtoon has developed the 'Toon Radar' system, a technology that identifies the initial illegal distributor through user identification information and uses it to track copies. Kakao Entertainment established the webtoon and web novel illegal distribution response task force (TF) called 'Peacock' and is actively responding. From January to June this year, Peacock deleted approximately 270 million illegal webtoons and web novels.

Despite corporate efforts, illegal distribution has not been eradicated. The industry has expressed disappointment over the first trial sentence of two years in prison for the operator of 'Ajitoon' and 'Ajitoon Novel' and the two years and six months sentence for the main culprit of the largest illegal webtoon site 'Bamtokki.' Current copyright law stipulates that infringement of copyright property rights through reproduction, public transmission, or distribution can be punished by imprisonment of up to five years or a fine of up to 50 million KRW, or both. A Naver Webtoon official said, "We hope that active discussions on strengthening punishment levels for copyright infringement offenders, such as punitive damages systems, will take place so that creators who have suffered damages can receive some compensation."

Professor Lee Dae-hee of Korea University Law School said, "It is important to create a social atmosphere where copyright infringement crimes are always detected and punished and to send such signals." He emphasized, "The Copyright Act stipulates compensation of up to 10 million KRW (50 million KRW if done intentionally for commercial purposes) for each infringed work, and a progressive interpretation of this by the courts is also a way to improve the problem of illegal distribution."

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