Up to 5 Million Won Fine against Spam Senders

Mobile users will pay less for wireless data services they use beginning next month. And businesses sending spam mail in a deceptive manner will be subject to up to a 5 million fine.

The Ministry of Information and Communication said on June 26 that the government would change its information technology-related regulations to better the e-life of the public.

First, mobile operators will lower service fees set for moving image downloads over mobile phones or personal digital assistants. SK Telecom has decided to cut down its video-on-demand moving image rate by 48% from the current 2.5 won per packet (512B) to 1.3 won per packet.

The hourly rate will also go down from 17 won per 10 minutes (12 won during early morning and 8 won during night time bands) to 15 won (11 won and 7 won). This means mobile users will be paying 17,277 won, instead of 30.402 won, for three 120KB-sized games, three 1.2MB movie trailers and ten 200KB contents.

When spam mail senders use such words as ‘A.D’ and ‘a.d.’ instead of ‘ad’ in an attempt to escape block solutions or authorities, they will have to pay up to 5 million won in fine. When sending mail containing adult materials, they must put ‘adult only’ in the title.

Beginning July, people will be able to find Internet addresses on yellow pages. In August, the ministry will introduce standard mobile phone battery chargers that work regardless of handset models. And KT (former Korea Telecom) bills will include long-distance charges of Dacom and Onse Telecom starting from November.

Im-Sook Ha artemes@donga.com