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Korea’s ‘Netiquette’ Grade: F

Posted January. 09, 2006 03:16,   

한국어

According to a recent survey, Korea’s internet users rank last in terms of “netiquette” (a compound word combining “network” and etiquette).

The Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC), the Government Information Agency (GIA), and the Information Communication Ethics Committee (ICEC) surveyed 1,000 Korean men women aged 13 to 65 about Korean internet users’ netiquette grades, and the MIC said yesterday that the survey result was 55.2 points.

Close to half those surveyed, or 45.6 percent, answered that the Korean netizens’ netiquette grade was 41 to 60.

In addition, 78.1 percent of the respondents said violence in cyber space is “serious,” while only 2.1 percent of those polled replied that violence on the net was not that serious.

In particular, the respondents of the survey selected “insults, including abusive language” (57.4 percent), “personal information leakage” (47.9 percent), and “defamation, including the circulation of false information” (35.6 percent) as typical anti-netiquette acts. Those surveyed picked the “sex trade in cyber space” (19.4 percent) and “cyber sexual harassment” (15.3 percent) as the first things that should be eradicated as well.

According to the counseling center for cyber defamation and sexual harassment under the ICEC, the number of counseling cases for cyber violence totaled 8,406 last year. The figure has increased more than two times compared to 2004 (3,913 cases).



Jae-Young Kim jaykim@donga.com