OpenAI’s ChatGPT (Image courtesy of Pexels/CCL)
SEOUL, May 29 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea has emerged as the world’s second-largest market for paid ChatGPT subscriptions, trailing only the United States, amid a dramatic surge in the use of generative AI services nationwide.
According to the 2024 Intelligent Information Society User Panel Survey released Thursday by the Korea Communications Commission and the Korea Information Society Development Institute (KISDI), the number of South Koreans paying for AI services grew more than sevenfold in 2024, rising from 0.9% to 7.0% of respondents.
The survey, which polled 4,420 internet users aged 15 to 69 across all 17 provinces, found that 24.0% had used generative AI services — nearly double the 12.3% recorded in 2023.
While text generation dominated AI use cases in 2023 (81.0%), last year saw a diversification in application: text generation (57.2%), voice and music synthesis (21.4%), and image creation (11.8%).
Users cited efficiency in information retrieval (87.9%), assistance with daily tasks (70.0%), and the desire for conversational interaction (69.5%) as top reasons for using AI.
Among those who had not used AI tools, key concerns included perceived difficulty (65.2%), fears over personal data leaks (58.9%), and complexity of use (57.3%).
Ethical transparency emerged as a central concern. Nearly 70% of respondents said AI recommendation services should disclose the criteria behind their content-filtering algorithms — a 16-point rise since 2022 and a 7-point increase from 2023 — underscoring growing public demand for algorithmic accountability.
Despite growing concerns, sentiment toward algorithm-driven platforms like search engines and YouTube remained largely positive. Most users (over 70%) said the recommendations aligned well with their preferences.
However, worries have shifted over time. In 2023, users most feared ideological bias in recommendations. By 2024, concerns had shifted to the exposure of illegal content on portal sites (47.4%) and personal data leaks on YouTube (48.2%).
The findings highlight South Korea’s accelerating embrace of AI technologies — coupled with rising expectations for ethical transparency and user protection in a fast-evolving digital environment.
Kevin Lee (kevinlee@koreabizwire.com)
