불법촬영물 사이트 만들면 처벌…광고게재 막아 ‘돈줄’ 막는다

The government is proposing stricter measures to combat illegal video sharing sites, including penalties and ad-blocking, to curb digital crimes. As the number of digital crime victims, particularly in the 10-20 age group, has surged from 2,087 in 2019 to 16,370 last year, the government aims to break the cycle of repeated offenses.

The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, Broadcasting & Entertainment Media Commission, and the National Police Agency formed the 'Comprehensive Digital Crime Response Consultative Body' to address this issue. They released a plan on the 20th, addressing the issue of illegal sites and their revenue sources.

Previously, the government focused on deleting victim content and blocking site access, but could not stop the emergence of similar sites or circumvention of bans. In 2019, there were 2,087 victims, which increased by five times to 16,370 last year. About 54.9% were new victims, while 45.1% were repeat victims. The government's analysis of illegal site operations revealed that despite 34,628 requests to delete duplicate content and block site access over eight years, 6,683 were still accessible domestically, with 1,316 featuring only Korean victims.

A single site sometimes posted Korean victims every 10 minutes, with some Korean victims appearing 215,000 times.

Some sites used content delivery network (CDN) services to avoid bans, or exploited new encryption techniques to weaken domestic access blocks. Major revenue sources for these sites were illegal advertisements, with 4,686 illegal banner ads on domestic-accessible sites alone. The average site had 34.7 banner ads, generating estimated profits between 2 and 12 billion won per year.

The government aims to curb revenue by blocking ad placements on illegal content distribution sites and penalizing violations. They plan to use the 'Enhanced Customer Verification System' from the Financial Action Task Force to freeze accounts used in illegal site operations. However, this may not be effective if the server is located abroad.

The government is also strengthening sanctions against foreign server providers. Ultimately, the government plans to criminalize the act of creating illegal sites and establish a specialized unit to hack into server locations and delete data. The government will also require social media platforms to delete child and youth sexual exploitation content and report it, with plans to amend the Youth Protection Act.