Illegal spamming part-time jobs lure teenagers

“Looking for a part-time job that can be done by texting? We pay 5,000 won a day, 50,000 won a week,” reads a job ad targeted to teenagers of illegal spamming.

According to the Korea Communications Commission and the Korea Internet Promotion Agency on Wednesday, the authorities became aware that a suspicious text reported by a citizen was sent by high school student A. The text included an Internet address that links to a Kakao Talk open chat channel promoting a specific stock.

Investigations revealed that A had applied for the job offer after noticing a “texting part-time job” on a social networking service. The spammer sent over unidentified several mobile phone numbers and text messages to A, who sent out up to 500 spamming messages daily as instructed. Such part-time work is commonly referred to as “telegram texting jobs” because telegram is used to hide the sender’s identity.

　


warum@donga.com