So-Called 'Excel Broadcasts' Causing Incidents and Accidents
Broadcasting Commission Guidelines Ineffective... No Legal Enforcement
Regulatory Strengthening Bill Pending in National Assembly Committee
Provocative internet broadcasts encouraging paid item sponsorships are rampant, leading to a series of incidents and accidents. Although the Korea Communications Commission currently has guidelines, they lack legal enforceability and have become ineffective. A bill to strengthen regulations has been submitted to the National Assembly, but it is on the verge of being discarded due to the expiration of the legislative term.
According to the police on the 27th, the family of a man in his 30s, Mr. A, who took extreme measures after incurring excessive debt to support internet broadcasts, filed a fraud complaint against the BJ and broadcast officials at the Seocho Police Station last November. The case has since been transferred to the Bangbae Police Station, where the investigation is ongoing.
Mr. A was known as a so-called ‘big spender’ (large sponsor), but in reality, he was an ordinary office worker who reportedly tried to prevent his favorite BJ from being expelled. The broadcast in question is known as an 'Excel broadcast,' where guest BJs publicly display the sponsorship amounts they receive in real-time to encourage more sponsorships. In this system, BJs with lower sponsorship rankings are expelled from the broadcast. Although AfreecaTV has a sponsorship limit, there is no way to prevent users from using multiple IDs or proxy payment services.
Excel broadcasts have been the cause of various incidents and accidents. In June last year, BJ Im Mo attempted an extreme act during a live broadcast and was transported to the hospital by the 119 emergency team but ultimately passed away. At the time, Im was conducting a drinking Excel broadcast and got into a dispute with other BJs. The broadcast had a rule that if a viewer donated 50,000 won, the BJ would drink alcohol, and the BJ who received the most donations ranked higher. Im was reportedly subjected to humiliating and sexually degrading words and actions.
A plenary meeting of the Science, Technology, Information and Broadcasting Communications Committee is underway at the National Assembly. [Photo by Yoon Dong-joo]
In 2018, the Korea Communications Commission established guidelines stating that the payment limit for paid sponsorship items in individual internet broadcasts should be restricted to 1 million won per user per day, and technical measures should be implemented to prevent charging or gifting beyond this limit. Additionally, if minors are allowed to make payments for paid sponsorship items, the consent of their legal guardians must be verified.
Furthermore, the system for individual internet broadcast services must prevent private transactions and theft of paid sponsorship items between users or between users and broadcasters, and ensure that gifts can only be made with items charged from the service itself. However, due to the lack of legal enforceability and the possibility of proxy or circumvented payments, provocative content encouraging excessive payments is rampant.
A regulatory bill has been proposed in the National Assembly but remains pending in the Science, Technology, Information and Communications Committee. In March 2021, Representative Han Junho of the Democratic Party submitted the ‘Amendment to the Telecommunications Business Act,’ which classifies internet individual broadcast operators as a special type of value-added telecommunications business operators. The core of the bill is to explicitly stipulate social responsibilities and obligations, such as preventing illegal monetary transactions by individual broadcast operators and imposing protective measures for youth. The aim is to create a healthy usage environment for internet individual broadcasts, but there has been no progress in discussions.
Professor Lee Woong-hyuk of Konkuk University’s Department of Police Science stated, “Typically, disconnection from social ties such as family, workplace, and friends leads to a tendency to over-immerse in internet broadcasts. The lack of proper control over proxy and circumvented sponsorships is also a problem,” adding, “This can be seen as a distorted aspect of Korean society caused by social disconnection and insufficient regulation.”
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