South Korean schools embroiled in deepfake porn crisis
By Ryan General
A deepfake porn crisis has gripped South Korea, with perpetrators using artificial intelligence technology to fabricate sexually explicit images of students, often targeting minors. Telegram chat rooms, some with thousands of members, have become hubs for sharing and creating deepfake porn.
- National crisis: Victims are often targeted based on their school affiliation, with some chat rooms specifically dedicated to individual students. Between Jan. 1 and Aug. 25, 781 individuals reported being victims of deepfake-related digital sex crimes, and a shocking 36.9% of them were minors. The crisis has sparked widespread fear and anger, with many calling for stricter punishments and better education on digital ethics.
- Protecting women and minors: The South Korean government has vowed to introduce stricter punishments for those involved in creating and sharing deepfake pornography and is investigating Telegram’s role in facilitating these crimes. Women’s rights advocates stress the need for comprehensive measures, including better education on digital ethics and addressing the underlying societal issues that contribute to such offenses. “The repeated violence against women in this country is a result of the state’s failure to listen to the numerous calls in the past raising alarms on the issue, lax punishment for perpetrators and a lack of awareness that such actions are crimes,” Kim Su-jeong, director of the Women’s Human Rights Counseling Center, told Yonhap.
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