Top 10 Most Searched News Keywords in Korea in 2023
No.1 is 'Typhoon Khanun'... Superconductor and Knife Attack Also Rank High
In Google's annual ranking of news search terms based on search analysis, 'Typhoon Khanun' topped the list, surpassing terms like 'Jeon Cheong-jo' and 'superconductor'.
On the 31st, Google released the report titled 'Looking Back at 2023 Through Google's Search Terms of the Year'. According to this, the most popular news search term in South Korea this year was Typhoon Khanun, the sixth typhoon that made landfall on the Korean Peninsula in August. Although the damage caused by Khanun was mainly concentrated in the southern regions, it also affected the Seoul metropolitan area, with the roof of a hanok house in Jongno-gu, Seoul collapsing and incidents of flooding and exterior wall collapse occurring in Incheon. The Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters estimated the damage caused by Typhoon Khanun to be approximately 55.8 billion KRW.
The second most searched news term was 'Jeon Cheong-jo'. Initially, he was known as 'Nam Seong', a third-generation chaebol and the remarriage partner of former national fencing athlete Nam Hyun-hee. However, as various suspicions arose, his past actions and fraudulent activities were uncovered, leading to his emergency arrest. Subsequent police investigations revealed that Jeon Cheong-jo is a woman born in 1996.
The third most searched domestic news term was 'superconductor'. At the end of July, domestic researchers announced the development of a superconductor, a dream material that exhibits superconductivity at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, exciting the global scientific community. However, it was later confirmed that the material was not a superconductor.
Ranked fourth was Moonbin, a member of the idol group 'ASTRO', whose death was reported in April. Following him, the fifth place was the Sillim Station stabbing incident, and sixth was the late Lee Seon-gyun, who was found dead by suicide in a park in Jongno-gu, Seoul on the 27th.
Seventh was the 25th World Scout Jamboree held in Saemangeum in August. Next, Lee Jae-myung, leader of the Democratic Party of Korea, ranked eighth, with a surge in news searches in September. At that time, searches such as 'Lee Jae-myung fasting' and 'Lee Jae-myung arrest' were common. Ninth was webtoon artist Joo Ho-min, who sparked controversy by accusing a special education teacher, who had guided his son with developmental disabilities, of child abuse. Tenth was the Seohyeon Station stabbing incident. The Sillim Station stabbing incident ranked fifth and the Seohyeon Station stabbing incident ranked tenth, both occurring consecutively in July and August, instilling fear among the public.
The most searched overseas news term in South Korea in 2023 was the war between Israel and the Gaza Strip. Second was 'X', the social networking service (SNS) formerly known as Twitter. Third was 'OpenAI', known for ChatGPT. Other overseas news search terms of the year included the T?rkiye earthquake, the metaverse-based SNS app 'Bondee', Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Shohei Ohtani, and Yevgeny Prigozhin, who died under mysterious circumstances in a plane crash in August.
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