FT Island’s new single “Satisfaction” hit the No. 2 on Japan’s Oricon single chart on Wednesday, demonstrating the band’s surging popularity in the biggest music market of Asia.The fourth single by FT Island was released Wednesday. First-day sales topped 17,665, sending the Korean music group's latest single to No. 2 slot on Oricon’s daily single chart. The title song, “Satisfaction,” has been use

Performance April 21, 2011

  Samsung Life Insurance Co., South Korea's top life insurer, said Thursday that its earnings more than doubled in fiscal 2010 from a year earlier thanks to investment gains from its securities holdings.   Net income came to 1.93 trillion won ($1.8 billion) during the fiscal year that ended on March 31, compared with 906.1 billion won a year earlier, Samsung Life said in a regulatory filing.    Sa

April 21, 2011

Eight out of 10 Internet users are using or have used at least one social network service, according to the survey conducted by Nielsen Company Korea.The survey was conducted on 1,000 Internet users in major cities in Korea including Seoul, Daejeon, Daegu, Gwangju and Busan from Feb. 25 to March 4 this year. Among the SNS platforms, Cyworld ranked most popular with 74.9 percent of respondents usin

Technology April 21, 2011

KT, a major telecom operator here, launched on Wednesday a prepaid financial service named “Mobile Money” that will be linked with accounts of Industrial Bank of Korea. The service is designed for smartphones equipped with the Android operating system 2.1 or higher. Compared with other “smart” banking systems, Mobile Money has a faster and easier authentication procedure, KT said.Users can charge

Technology April 21, 2011

A 10-year-old boy in Liaoning province pretended to be his own parent in order to chat online with his teachers and the parents of his classmates.He kept up the ruse for nearly a year before his cover was blown.Registering as "Lulu's parent", the boy communicated with other parents and teachers in a group talking room on the instant messaging service set up by his teacher in a primary school in Da

World News April 20, 2011

A fake police officer's cover was blown recently when two of the women he was dating and cheating money out of bumped into each another, triggering a series of events that exposed him.The man, surnamed Xuan, had pretended to be a high-ranking police officer for six years in Anshan, Liaoning province, to impress gullible women and help him trick them out of money.But he came unstuck when he visited

People April 18, 2011

   President Lee Myung-bak on Monday called for tearing down prejudices about the disabled, saying that their physical challenges never mean they cannot be as competitive as the non-disabled.   "I believe that the disabled can be competitive workers as much as they want, depending on the types of work and duties," Lee said in his biweekly radio address ahead of the April 20 Day for the Disabled, c

Social Affairs April 18, 2011

 South Korea's listed companies paid out 33 percent more in dividends to foreign shareholders in 2010 than a year earlier, helped by an increase in earnings, data showed Monday.   A total of 4.97 trillion won ($4.6 billion) in dividends were paid to foreigners last year, compared with 3.73 trillion won in the previous year, according to the data by the Korea Exchange (KRX).   Last year's dividend

April 18, 2011