This file photo shows school kids looking at their smartphones. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Feb. 4 (Korea Bizwire) — Close to 1 in 5 of South Korean teenagers have participated in open chats, a primary source of online grooming, or luring minors through the internet to sexually illicit businesses, a report said Thursday.
An “open chat” is a KakaoTalk feature which allows you to join special interest groups with a simple tap or click of a link.
The National Youth Policy Institute conducted a survey of 3,789 teenagers between the ages of 12 and 19, in which 16.3 percent, or 21.7 percent of young women, had owned or used an anonymous social account.
Roughly 20 percent of all teenagers had joined an open chat, 75.4 percent of whom had received private messages from a stranger.
Some 10 percent of teenage girls attending middle school or high school, including 12.4 percent of high school freshmen and 14.3 percent of 7th graders, had received gifts via online channels from a stranger for no reason.
Another 10 percent of all teenagers had an offline meeting with a stranger they had met online, including 15.4 percent of female 8th graders and 16.7 percent of high school sophomores.
Lina Jang (linajang@koreabizwire.com)
