Facebook temporarily down in Korea on Election Day

Some Facebook users in Korea were unable to access their social media accounts Tuesday morning, the day of the country’s presidential election.At around 10 a.m., users said they tried to log into their Facebook accounts, but were not able to gain access for around 50 minutes. The site only said, “Sorry, something went wrong. We’re working on it and we’ll get it fixed as soon as we can.”The Korean arm of the social media giant issued a statement around 11:30 a.m., saying, “Some users had difficul

May 9, 2017

Naver set to unveil AI-based smart speaker in summer

Naver Corp., South Korea's top Internet portal operator, plans to unveil an artificial intelligence embedded smart speaker, the WAVE, this summer, industry sources said Tuesday.According to the sources, Naver and its Japanese affiliate LINE Corp. are working to launch the smart speaker based on its AI virtual assistant, Clova CLOud Virtual Assistant, before the end of the first half. Naver Corp.'s auto infotainment platform, IVI (Yonhap)The WAVE speaker is said to be unveiled in Japan under the

May 9, 2017

LG Electronics rules out acquisition of Pantech

LG Electronics Inc. on Monday ruled out the rumor that the company is considering the acquisition of South Korea's No. 3 smartphone manufacturer, Pantech Co.Through a regulatory filing made after getting the request from the Korea Exchange, the main bourse operator, South Korea's No. 2 tech giant said it has never considered purchasing Pantech. (Yonhap)After facing financial troubles, Pantech was normalized in late 2015 after Solid Inc. listed the company on the secondary bourse Kosdaq acquired

May 8, 2017

[Election 2017] Tech giants aim to provide accurate, real-time data for presidential election

As South Korea prepares to hold its 19th presidential election Tuesday, the country’s major internet companies have set out to provide the public with accurate, timely and convenient information about the candidates and real-time voting updates. Naver, the operator of Korea’s most widely-accessed portal website, has a special section on its election page that will continuously update voting information as the results come in. The portal operator said it will display the information based on real

May 8, 2017

LG grows $2b brand in India after 20 years

In its 20th year in India, LG Electronics has grown to a $2 billion brand, owing to localization efforts, the company said Monday. According to company data, LG’s sales there grew about 60 times to reach $2 billion as of last year, having first entered the Indian market in 1997.  Indian consumers check out a water purifier at an LG Electronics shop in Noida, northern India, on Monday. (LG Electronics)In the past two decades, the number of LG employees and executives operating in the country expa

May 8, 2017

Cheaper clamshell phones favored by elderly consumers

Affordable flip phones launched by Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics have proved popular among the elderly, according to statistics provided by SK Telecom’s T world Direct on Monday, which was Parents’ Day. Samsung’s Galaxy Folder LTE and LG’s Wine Smart Jazz were best-sellers among consumers in their 60s and 70s, comprising 77 percent and 75 percent of purchases respectively. (LG Electronics)The two representative clamshell phones were set at 57,000 won ($50.30) and 31,000 won, respectivel

May 8, 2017

[Health-tech Korea] Vuno's AI analyzes X-rays to provide instant estimate of bone development

The Korea Herald is publishing a series of articles highlighting South Korea’s promising startups in the emerging sectors of digital health care and next-generation medical devices. This is the eighth installment. – Ed.Recent advances in artificial intelligence have begun to revolutionize the field of medicine and health care, as machines show potential to improve the diagnosis of illnesses and treatment planning.At the core of the movement is a form of high-level machine learning called deep le

May 7, 2017

Number of people changing mobile carriers reaches 120,000 in May

The number of people who switched their mobile carriers in the first six days of May reached just shy of 120,000, industry data showed Sunday.The total who transferred to a new service provider in the six-day period that ended Saturday represents a 30 percent increase compared with the year before. This translates to a daily average of 19,000 people changing their carriers. (Yonhap)The spike in so-called number portability comes as local service providers offered hefty incentives to customers to

May 7, 2017

LG hits record phone market share in US

South Korean handset provider LG Electronics reached 20 percent share of the US smartphone market for the first time, solidifying its position as the world’s third-largest smartphone maker after Apple and Samsung. According to data from Strategic Analytics on Sunday, LG shipped 7.3 million smartphones in the first quarter of the year, accounting for a fifth of the world’s biggest handset market. The market share for LG rose nearly 3 percentage points from a year earlier. The gain follows steady

May 7, 2017

LG's webOS smart TV gets highest security level

The latest webOS smart TV by LG Electronics Inc. has been certified for its effective security capability and sustainability by a local agency, the company said Sunday.The tech giant said its latest version of the webOS smart TV platform received the Evaluation Assurance Level 2 by the IT Security Certification Center, becoming the first smart TV in the world to receive the cybersecurity level. (Yonhap)LG said the smart TV adopts a slew of the latest cybersecurity technologies to reduce malware

May 7, 2017

Prevalence of ovarian cancer among 20-somethings soars

The prevalence of ovarian cancer among South Korean women in their 20s has jumped nearly 50 percent over the past five years due to a change in their life patterns, data showed Sunday.According to the data by the Health Insurance Review & Assessment Service, 20-something ovarian cancer patients stood at 1,218 last year, up a whopping 48 percent from 825 in 2012. (Yonhap)Last year's figure accounted for 6.7 percent of all ovarian cancer patients in the country, but the increase rate outpaced that

May 7, 2017

Naver launches new fine dust tracking service

Wary of growing concerns over worsening air quality, South Korea’s internet giant Naver on Thursday introduced a new visual mapping service that tracks the movement of fine dust in Korea, Japan and China.　The new fine dust mapping service can be accessed by searching for fine dust levels on Naver via either PC or mobile device.(Naver)Previously, Naver had provided only numerical figures that showed the level of fine dust in different cities in Korea. The new feature visually displays the changes

May 4, 2017

Rising number of seniors prefer smartphones over flip-phones

A rising number of seniors are purchasing the latest smartphones, industry data showed Thursday, breaking the perception that older users normally buy traditional handsets with buttons.According to the data compiled SK Telecom Co., 74 percent of its users aged 60 and above used smartphones as of April. The number compares to the 10 percent posted by a separate survey conducted by Gallup Korea in 2012. (Yonhap)The mobile carrier also said 40 percent of its clients aged 65 an above purchased Samsu

May 4, 2017

US to probe LG-Blu patent complaints

The US International Trade Commission began investigating whether the US smartphone maker Blu infringed standard patents of LG Electronics’ Long Term Evolution, according to the independent federal agency. Blu, established in 2009, is the sixth-largest handset maker in the North American market, selling low-end phones worth below $300. The firm sold around 5.2 million units last year -- a 68 percent growth from the previous year. LG Electronics is the third-largest handset maker in the US, with

May 3, 2017

Premium product sales help LG sidestep Samsung in Q1 TV earnings

Strong sales of premium products allowed LG Electronics to beat out its main rival Samsung Electronics in the first-quarter TV market earnings race, data showed Wednesday.According to LG, its Home Entertainment (HE) division, which focuses on TVs, posted a record-high operating profit of 382.2 billion won ($338 million) in the January-March period. Its operating profit ratio reached 8.8 percent, the highest ever for the first three months of any year.Samsung Consumer Electronics (CE) division, w

May 3, 2017

[Photo News] LG CNS introduces electronic labeling system for supermarkets

SMART LABELING -- A GS Supermarket employee uses a mobile manager program connected to LG CNS’ Electronic Shelf Label to digitally change the price labels for vegetables Tuesday. LG CNS has commercialized its ESL system, which displays prices on digital labels that can be altered to reflect special sales and promotions, at 100 GS Supermarket outlets nationwide. (LG CNS)

May 2, 2017

Samsung likely to become No. 1 chipmaker in Q2: IC Insights

Samsung Electronics Co. is expected to emerge as the top chipmaker in the world by beating US rival Intel Corp. in the second quarter of this year, a report showed Tuesday.According to the data compiled by industry tracker IC Insights, Samsung is expected to post sales of $14.9 billion in the April-June period, up 7.5 percent from the previous quarter. The estimate is higher than the $14.4 billion expected for Intel.(Yonhap)In the first quarter, Intel posted sales of $14.2 billion, hovering abov

May 2, 2017

Samsung Pay available for Gear S3 smartwatch

Samsung Electronics Co. said Tuesday it has incorporated its mobile transaction system on its Gear S3 smartwatch.Samsung said the Gear S3 smartphone will connect to Samsung Pay installed on smartphones, allowing users to make payments using the wearable instead of taking out their mobile devices. (Yonhap)The South Korean tech giant had originally planned to introduce the service on the Gear S3 smartwatch in September 2016, but the plan was delayed due to the slow pace of talks with local credit

May 2, 2017

[Election 2017] Presidential candidates vow support for ‘digital economy’

South Korea’s presidential candidates may differ in their campaign pledges on defense, labor and political reform, but they appear to have one common ground -- spurring growth through the “digital economy.” The digital economy, sometimes referred to as the “internet economy,” broadly refers to the economic activity that results from billions of everyday online connections among people, businesses, devices, data and processes, according to Deloitte.This new type of economy is backed by the growin

May 1, 2017

SK Telecom launches 3 IoT devices

South Korea's top mobile carrier SK Telecom Co. said Monday that it has launched three gadgets using Internet of Things technology. The IoT tech, which allows everyday appliances to link to the Internet, is seen as one of the major technological developments of the Internet and a new revenue source for telecoms firms.  (Yonhap)"Keyco" is an IoT-based keychain with an embedded GPS chip for pets that can be controlled by a smartphone, allowing the owner to pinpoint the location of their pets, the

May 1, 2017