South Korea’s contraband trade shot up 60 percent in the first half of the year on a spike in tariff evasion and country-of-origin violations, the customs agency said.

The Korea Customs Service said it detected and confiscated about 3 trillion won ($2.3 billion) worth of illegal goods and unlawful transactions in the January-June period, compared with 1.9 trillion won a year earlier.

Yet the number of contraband cases sank 28 percent on-year to 849 in the six-month period.

The KCS defines contraband as improperly declared goods, banned substances like narcotics, goods that cannot be traded legally and foreign exchange-related violations. (Yonhap)