Naver at War with Malicious Comments for 5 Years... Removed 'Like' and 'Dislike' Buttons as Well

[Asia Economy Reporter Kang Nahum] Naver, which has been waging a "war against malicious comments" for five years, has changed the "emotion sticker" feature in its news service to "recommendation stickers." The existing evaluation functions such as "angry" and "like" have been removed, and the policy has been shifted to focus on article recommendations.

According to Naver on the 2nd, the five empathy buttons that were provided at the bottom of its articles to express emotions felt while reading the news were changed to recommendation stickers starting from the 28th of last month. The newly changed article recommendation stickers consist of five buttons: Solsol Information, Exciting, Empathy 100%, Excellent Analysis, and Strong Follow-up Recommendation, focusing on evaluating the article content. The previous buttons such as Like, Heartwarming, Sad, and Angry have disappeared.

Naver's policy change is intended to discover good articles carefully written by media companies based on user reactions, but it is interpreted as an effort to prevent public opinion distortion. The "Like" and "Dislike" buttons displayed at the bottom of articles have been regarded as a means reflecting public opinion. Therefore, there have been concerns that if empathy buttons are manipulated like past comment manipulations, public opinion could be distorted.

Under the pretext of preventing malicious comments and public opinion distortion, Naver has improved its news comment policies over the past four years. Following the Druking incident in April 2018, comments per article were limited to three. In April 2019, it introduced the "AI Cleanbot," which automatically filters comments containing profanity or malicious content. In March 2020, it suspended comments on entertainment news, and in August of the same year, it expanded the suspension of comment services to sports news. In May last year, it began limiting anonymity by revealing the profile pictures of comment authors.

User reactions have been negative. As opportunities to express opinions continue to decrease due to strengthened news comment policies, users cannot even send negative opinions about articles, which is considered somewhat excessive. One netizen pointed out, "In effect, only positive expressions can be made on all articles, which infringes on freedom of expression."

There are also suggestions that media companies themselves should strengthen their reporting responsibilities to escape such controversies. Professor Yoo Hongsik of the Department of Media Communication at Chung-Ang University said, "This problem arises because Naver is a dominant player monopolizing news distribution," adding, "It would be a more desirable direction if media companies gain strength and meet readers with high-quality news."