Almost every South Korean in their teens or 20s is using some form of over-the-top media service, a report by the Korea Communications Commission showed Thursday. About 97.8 percent of all 20-somethings and 97.6 percent of teenagers aged 13 and above were using subscription-based streaming services, the highest out of all age groups. Overall, 77 percent of the general population were using OTT services, up five percent from the year before. The state-run organization conducted a survey on 7,055

Television Dec. 31, 2023

Roughly seven out of 10 cancer patients in South Korea survive at least five years after cancer is detected, but the number of new cancer patients is at an all-time high according to a state report released Thursday. The five-year relative survival rate for people diagnosed with cancer between 2017 and 2021 was 72.1 percent, according to the joint report by the Ministry of Health and Welfare and Korea Central Cancer Registry. It increased from 65.5 percent in 2016, and marked a significant incre

Social Affairs Dec. 31, 2023

Chinese zodiac is a system of belief that assigns an animal to each year and assumes one's fate is closely linked to this classification. As such, there are "lucky" and "unlucky" years for each person. In the year 2024, which is the year of the blue dragon, those born in the year of the monkey are expected to be lucky. The dragon and the monkey are part of the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac system, in the order of: rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, mo

Culture Dec. 30, 2023

A South Korean man killed his son and was later found dead, local police said Thursday. According to Ulju Police Station in Ulsan, the man in his 40s gravely injured his 20-something son with a weapon at 4:32 p.m. on Wednesday on the streets and quickly fled the scene. The victim received medical treatment at a nearby hospital, but died less than an hour later at 5:21 p.m. that day. Police tracked down the culprit and found him dead inside a car parked about 5 kilometers from the crime scene. In

Social Affairs Dec. 28, 2023

A woman suspected of blackmailing actor Lee Sun-kyun was taken into custody by local police late Wednesday, a few hours after the actor was found dead in an apparent suicide. According to reports, Incheon Metropolitan Police Agency apprehended the suspect in her 20s after she failed to appear at Incheon District Court Tuesday for a scheduled substantive review of her arrest warrant. In Korea, substantive review of an arrest warrant is a process by which an individual the police seeks to arrest m

Social Affairs Dec. 28, 2023

A person who paid two teenagers to vandalize the walls of Gyeongbokgung had also ordered another teen to graffiti subway stations in Daegu, a police investigation found Wednesday. The individual identified as "team leader Lee," thought to have paid a 17-year-old male surnamed Im and 16-year-old female to graffiti the palace walls with the web addresses to illegal video streaming platforms, is also believed to have contacted another teen in Daegu on Dec. 18 for a similar request. Lee to

Social Affairs Dec. 27, 2023

South Korea is being plagued by illegal ticket sales ranging from music and other forms of performing arts to reservations for hotels, restaurants and popular services all throughout the country. An online post on Joonggonara, a website for secondhand sales, offered a reservation for a meal for two at a high-end sushi restaurant in Gangnam's Cheongdam-dong, an affluent region in southern Seoul, for 540,000 won ($410) -- 100,000 won more than the original price. A separate post on the simila

Social Affairs Dec. 27, 2023

South Korean police confirmed that Lee Sun-kyun had been found dead Wednesday morning at Waryong Park in northern Jongno-gu in Seoul. He had been under investigation for alleged drug use. Police confirmed his identity after earlier reports said the body of a man suspected to be the well-known actor had been found at the park. Lee was found unconscious inside of his car at around 10:30 a.m., having inhaled smoke from charcoal briquette. Emergency workers said he was already dead at the time of

Social Affairs Dec. 27, 2023

Earlier this month, online communities across South Korea were abuzz with a story of a group of high school students who fled from a local eatery without paying. On the back of a bill, they wrote "I'm sorry but you didn't check our IDs. If we report you, you'll get shut down. We'll just go. We'll come back later after we're adults." Legal minors reporting themselves after consuming alcohol, or threatening to do so, is quickly becoming a social issue. South

Social Affairs Dec. 26, 2023

The number of 40-somethings with employment as surveyed in the month of November dropped to the lowest point since 2003, data showed Tuesday. According to Statistics Korea, 6.25 million people in their 40s in Korea were employed, down 62,000 from the same month last year. The figure has been on a downward trend after peaking at 6.94 million in 2014. The drop in working South Koreans in their 40s is in direct correlation with the decrease in the general population in the age group. South Koreans

Economy Dec. 26, 2023

A Suwon district court recently handed down a jail term to a man in his 20s for evading his military duties. The man had reportedly vowed to to fulfill his duties when first accused but later claimed to be a conscientious objector based on his sexuality, according to local media reports, Tuesday. The defendant was sentenced to one year and six months behind bars by the appellate division of the Suwon court, which upheld an earlier ruling that punished him for violating the Military Service A

Social Affairs Dec. 26, 2023

Gyeonggi Province fire authorities said Friday that veteran rescue dog A-rong is retiring after a six-year stint, and is seeking a new family. A-rong, a male Labrador retriever weighing 32 kilograms, was born in 2014 and participated in 312 rescue operations and aided the rescue of nine individuals, according to the Gyeonggi Fire and Disaster Headquarters. A member of the Gyeonggi-do Northern Special Response Unit since December of 2017, he has had special training for rescue operations in the m

Social Affairs Dec. 24, 2023

With the country's record-low birth rate expected to fall even further next year, regional governments across the country have been implementing policies to motivate South Korean families to have more children. A December report by Statistics Korea projected that the country's total fertility rate -- the number of children a woman is expected to have in her lifetime -- will be 0.68 in 2024 and 0.65 in 2025. South Korea already recorded the lowest figure in the world with 0.78 in 2022,

Social Affairs Dec. 24, 2023

A Korea Railroad Corp. employee who was fired for looking up personal information related to BTS' RM has recently been reinstated, a report obtained by a lawmaker showed Friday. The National Labor Relations Commission last Thursday ordered the state-run railway operator to give back the female staffer's job, along with reimbursement for wages that the staff would have made if she had not been fired in April, according to the Democratic Party of Korea's Rep. Kim Doo-kwan, who got a

Social Affairs Dec. 22, 2023

A Seoul resident would have to not spend a single dime of their income for 15.2 years to buy a home in South Korea's capital, a state-issued report showed Friday. The Price Income Ratio for Seoul for 2022 was 15.2, according to the latest report by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. The yearly PIR increased from 14.1 in 2021, and has been on the upward trend since marking 9.6 in 2018. The PRI refers to the median home price of a certain region divided by the median yearly h

Social Affairs Dec. 22, 2023