The Korea Communications Commission (KCC) has released audit results revealing that government subsidies in the fact-checking project initiated during the Moon Jae-in administration under the Viewer Media Foundation were excessively paid as personnel expenses to subsidy recipients. The KCC has notified the recipients to recover the overpaid subsidies and requested investigative authorities to investigate related parties on suspicions of using the subsidies for purposes other than intended.
On the 18th, Cho Sung-eun, Secretary-General of the KCC, held a briefing at the Government Complex Gwacheon and announced the audit results, stating, "Given previous criticisms regarding political bias and the suspension of part of the project due to the voluntary dissolution of subsidy recipients, we focused on the fact-checking project and systematically reviewed the entire process including the selection of subsidy recipients, project execution, and subsidy disbursement."
The KCC pointed out that in 2021, a subsidy recipient who carried out the ‘Platform Advancement Project’ as part of the fact-checking project applied for personnel expenses based on average wages of software engineers and others, which were higher than actual salaries. The Foundation accepted this as is and paid approximately 340 million KRW, significantly exceeding the usual personnel expenses of about 180 million KRW. For example, the actual monthly salary of the development manager, Mr. Kim, was 5.3 million KRW, but the Foundation applied the average wage of IT planners and calculated the standard salary as 9.2 million KRW.
The KCC also revealed multiple issues in the ownership transfer process of the fact-checking project deliverables. Contrary to the initial announcement in 2020 that the ownership of the fact-checking platform, a deliverable of the project, belonged to the KCC, the Foundation signed an agreement attributing ownership of the platform to the subsidy recipient.
Furthermore, regarding the 2021 project deliverable, the fact-checking mobile app, the KCC pointed out that despite the initial announcement stating that ownership belonged to the Foundation, the agreement was signed to assign ownership to a third-party organization, neither the Foundation nor the subsidy recipient.
During the review of the agreement documents, it was found that the initial announcement details were neither properly reported nor reviewed, and the budget adjustment procedures for the subsidy recipient’s asset acquisition were not followed.
The KCC issued a warning to those responsible for the improper decision to transfer platform ownership and demanded disciplinary action against those responsible for the improper transfer of ownership of the fact-checking mobile app.
Additionally, the KCC issued warnings or cautions regarding ▲ improper designation of indirect subsidy recipients in the platform advancement project ▲ inappropriate public recruitment and selection of subsidy recipients and indirect subsidy recipients ▲ improper establishment and utilization of technology-based fact-checking systems ▲ improper contracting for fact-checking platform development ▲ improper execution and settlement of indirect subsidies ▲ improper performance measurement of fact-checking deliverables ▲ improper recognition of experience for fixed-term contract hires ▲ excessive welfare expenses and other budget mismanagement ▲ improper conclusion of non-competitive contracts ▲ improper support for village community media content production activities.
Meanwhile, the fact-checking project is currently suspended as the subsidy recipient voluntarily dissolved due to budget cuts and other reasons. The KCC expects the project to resume in the second half of the year after a new public recruitment process.
The KCC stated that while the fact-checking project institutions have been operating the platform themselves until now, going forward, the Foundation will directly manage the platform, and the project institutions will focus solely on project execution. They also plan to select multiple fact-checking institutions, establish an independent project operation committee, and have the project performance evaluated by a credible institution.
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