South Korean Regulator Fines Crypto Exchanges over Privacy Failures

The South Korea government has today issued fines totaling 141 million won ($130,000) to domestic cryptocurrency exchanges for providing insufficient user data protection.

In a public announcement, the Korea Communications Commission (KCC) said the penalty is a result of an investigation that the agency conducted from Oct. 10 to Dec. 28 in 2017 across 10 domestic crypto exchanges. Launched as a ministry-level agency, KCC is responsible for regulating the broadcasting and telecommunications sector, as well citizen's information protection.

Among the 10 surveyed companies, eight were found to be violating the Information and Communication Network Act, which mandates user privacy protection methods, according to the announcement.

The eight penalized companies are: Upbit, Ripple4y, Coinpia, Youbit, Korbit, Coinone and Coinplug, as well as Eyalabs, a cryptocurrency wallet service. According to the agency, the individual fines range from $9,000 to $14,000.

The announcement details that critical violations include some exchanges failing to delete users' data even when they had stopped using the service for over a year, and some others storing users' data outside of the country.

KCC chairman Lee Hyo-Sung said: