Police: "Concern Over Causing Confusion in Social Atmosphere"
"Will Focus on Preventing Spread"
A spam message impersonating a police officer, instructing not to open foreign news articles related to former President Park Geun-hye, is spreading, prompting caution.
According to Yonhap News and others on the 17th, a message titled "Urgent. Do not open the CNN article titled 'Park Geun-hye Death'" has recently been circulating mainly through messengers.
The message stated that an email titled "Worrisome Republic of Korea" related to the Choi Soon-sil incident was being distributed, and that "(this) is an email containing malicious code created in North Korea yesterday." It continued, "The moment you open it, your phone will be taken over by North Korean hackers. Please inform those around you," and at the bottom of the message was the name of a specific police officer affiliated with the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency. However, it was confirmed that this was a spoofed message, not officially sent by the police.
Similar messages had spread in the past, prompting police warnings. In 2016, a similar message titled not to open a CNN article called "Park Geun-hye Resignation" circulated. That message also appeared to be officially sent by the police, with a police officer’s name listed at the bottom.
As such messages continued to spread, last year the police sent official letters requesting KT, LG Uplus, SKT, and KakaoTalk, among the three major telecom companies, to block the transmission of messages containing specific combined strings to prevent the spread of these messages. However, since several years have passed since the messages first circulated, the distribution range is wide, and the messages do not contain specific links, it is practically difficult to identify the original sender at this point.
The police also explained that since the messages do not contain content likely to cause specific harm, there are no immediate plans to launch an investigation to trace the original sender. A police official said, "When the messages were first distributed in 2016, we considered investigating for defamation related to the unauthorized use of a specific police officer’s name, but after considering various factors including the message content, we decided not to proceed with an investigation." He added, "However, since these messages could cause confusion in society, we will continue to communicate with related agencies and focus on preventing their spread."
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