High school students wearing protective masks pose for a photo during a graduation ceremony on Jan. 13, 2021. (Pool photo) (Yonhap)
SEOUL, March 10 (Korea Bizwire) — Graduation albums containing personal names and photos are being exploited for criminal activities.
In one case, a student’s parents ended up stalking a teacher after finding the teacher’s photo in the student’s graduation album. The albums were also used to voice phish old teachers by criminals pretending to be their former students.
As personal information is being leaked from graduation albums for criminal purposes, some teachers are choosing not to include their photos in the album.
In a survey last year, the Busan Teachers Union reported that 91.6 percent of teachers didn’t want their photos to be published in the school’s graduation album.
Experts say that graduation albums hold personal information as stipulated by law. If they are exploited for profit-making purposes or other unintended means, it may be seen as a violation of the country’s privacy laws.
Graduation albums have always been a potential source of personal information leaks, however, even if they are published for those who just want to keep their memories.
“These photos were taken based on the student’s consent that they will be published and distributed as graduation albums. So, even if they end up being leaked, it will fall short of a privacy infringement,” said Kim Min-ho, a law professor at Sungkyunkwan University.
Some argue that the publication of graduation albums is an outdated practice that needs to be changed.
In fact, some schools are making smaller graduation albums for each class, or earning prior consent from students and teachers to take photos.
M. H. Lee (mhlee@koreabizwire.com)
