KT, a leading South Korean telecommunication business, said Wednesday it joined the LEAD Company under the United Nations Global Compact to help fight contagious diseases through global partnership.

The LEAD Company is an organization of about 40 companies. It calls for businesses leaders around the world to help achieve the UN sustainable development goals. 

KT has proposed a project to prevent the spread of infectious diseases by using its roaming big data system. The plan is only possible on the condition of sharing roaming information among mobile carriers across the globe as KT Chairman Hwang Chang-gyu suggested last June at the UNGC Leaders Summit.

It created a smart quarantine information system for a state-run project last November by using the mobile phone roaming information of travelers, which helps the country’s health authorities prevent the spread of diseases. The company is currently considering the establishment of a quarantine information system in collaboration with Chinese and Japanese mobile carriers, it said.

By Song Su-hyun (song@heraldcorp.com)