Seoul: Four people have been charged in South Korea with hacking into tens of thousands of private video cameras in homes and businesses in search of sexually exploitative footage, authorities said on Monday.
In a news release, the Korean National Police Agency said the suspects stole footage from about 120,000 cameras, illegally manipulating and selling hundreds of videos to an overseas-based website.
Some 120,000 internet-connected personal cameras were breached in South Korea by hackers searching for explicit content.Credit: Bloomberg
Two of the suspects combined had contributed more than half the content on the website, the release said. They were investigated between November last year and October and did not know each other, Kim Young-woon, chief of the agency’s Cyber Terror Investigation Unit, said in an interview.
One of the suspects is charged with producing sexually exploitative content of children and adolescents. Police allege the footage stolen by that suspect had been stored but not sold.
All four are charged with hacking internet-connected surveillance cameras, and two are charged with selling illegally filmed sexually exploitative material.
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Distributing or selling pornography is largely illegal in South Korea. The charge of sexual exploitation is for taking footage of a person’s body against their will, Kim said.
Illegally filmed videos have been a major issue and catalyst for the feminist movement in South Korea, where authorities have cracked down on hidden cameras, known as “molka”, in public places such as swimming pools, hotels and public bathrooms.
One suspect is alleged to have been paid about $US24,000 ($36,400) worth of virtual assets in exchange for the stolen videos, and another about $US12,000.
