(image: Kobiz Media / Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, Sept. 10 (Korea Bizwire) — A handful of foreign information technology (IT) companies have been identified as having been negligent in their duties of operating domestic representatives for personal information.
The domestic representatives are supposed to act on their behalf to perform the duties of a person responsible for management of personal information.
The Personal Information Protection Commission, a newly launched minister-level government body, announced on Wednesday that it had issued a recommendation of improvement to a total of seven foreign IT companies which were found to have been negligent in their duties of operating domestic representatives.
All of the 34 businesses that are obliged to designate domestic representatives were confirmed to have been complying with the obligation.
Among them, however, five companies – Booking.com, Facebook, Microsoft, Supercell and Twitch – were found to have been negligent in dealing with consumer complaints related to the processing of personal information.
Three businesses – Facebook, Nike and Tik Tok – were found not to have included the name, address, phone number and email address of the domestic representatives in their personal information processing policy.
Under the Personal Information Protection Act, foreign IT service providers are required to designate and operate domestic representatives.
This piece of legislation was designed to enable South Korean citizens to exercise their right of self-decision on the withdrawal of agreement on collection, use and provision of personal information.
M. H. Lee (mhlee@koreabizwire.com)
