Over 80,000 Cases of Illegally Distributed Personal Information Deleted by Naver

Over 80,000 Cases of Illegally Distributed Personal Information Deleted on Naver Over 5 Years

It has been revealed that over 80,000 posts containing personal information illegally distributed on Naver have been deleted over the past five years.

According to data submitted by the Personal Information Protection Commission to the office of Lee Jeong-moon, a member of the Democratic Party of Korea, on the 21st, a total of 80,930 posts containing illegally distributed personal information were deleted on Naver from 2020 to August of this year. X (formerly Twitter) followed with 70,869 posts.

The number of illegally distributed posts deleted on Naver has been increasing: 15,960 in 2020, 15,741 in 2021, 16,651 in 2022, and 20,419 in 2023. This year, 12,101 posts were deleted up to August. On X, deleted posts also continued to rise with 6,435 in 2020, 14,817 in 2021, 16,278 in 2022, and 22,253 in 2023, with 11,086 posts deleted up to August this year.

Among the top 10 companies with the most deleted posts of illegally distributed personal information, besides Naver and X, Google, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and DC Inside were also listed. This year, Taobao was included in the top 10 as well.

The illegally distributed personal information varies, including names, resident registration numbers, and contact information. The Personal Information Protection Commission explained, "When posts containing illegally distributed personal information are detected, the relevant service providers are requested to delete the posts at least three times via wired or wireless communication, and the results of the actions are confirmed. If the service provider is unreachable due to contact loss or business closure, a blocking review request is submitted to the Korea Communications Standards Commission."