Lee Gyu-lee is a business writer at The Korea Times, focusing primarily on IT & telecommunications, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy and KOTRA. Prior to this, she has covered a wide range of cultural news, from film, television and K-pop to lifestyle and fashion.
SK Telecom enjoys subscriber growth with KT's termination penalty waiver
A sign for an early termination fee waiver is seen at a retail store in Seoul, Sunday. Yonhap
By Lee Gyu-lee
Over 216,000 KT users switch to rival carriers
KT’s fee waiver for early contract termination in the wake of its mobile payment fraud case, has triggered a rapid surge in subscriber outflows, with SK Telecom emerging as the biggest beneficiary.
As the waiver exemption nears its end, the subscriber exodus has accelerated sharply, with daily churn surpassing 30,000 for the first time over the weekend. On Saturday alone, the telecom company lost about 33,300 subscribers. The majority of them, over 22,100, moved to SK Telecom, while about 8,000 joined LG Uplus and about 3,000 shifted to mobile virtual network operators.
From Dec. 31, 2025, when the waiver took effect, until Saturday, a total of over 216,000 subscribers have switched from KT to rival carriers, with about three-quarters of those subscribers opting for SK Telecom during that period.
KT rolled out a termination fee waiver late last month in response to a major data breach that resulted in unauthorized mobile payments among some of its users, allowing subscribers to terminate their services at no penalty until Tuesday. The program was retroactive to Sept. 1, 2025, for those who had already terminated their contracts.
KT CEO Kim Young-shub bows in apology for a string of unauthorized mobile payment fraud cases involving the telecom company during a press conference at KT headquarters in Seoul, Dec. 30, 2025. Yonhap
The latest outflow from KT already exceeds the scale seen during SK Telecom’s massive universal subscriber identity module breach last year. Last July, about 166,000 SK Telecom subscribers left the carrier over a 10-day waiver period. By comparison, KT has lost roughly 50,000 more users over a similar time frame, highlighting the intensity of the exodus.
With the waiver expiring on Tuesday, the final day is expected to see an even further spike in switching, as subscribers rush to join the penalty-free exit at the last minute. During SK Telecom’s fee waiver period last year, more than a quarter of the total exodus occurred during the final day, spiking the churn to 66 percent from the previous day.
For SK Telecom, the timing is significant, given the country’s largest telecom company has been struggling to regain its 40 percent market share since it slipped below the threshold following last year’s data breach.
To accelerate gains, SK Telecom has been offering aggressive incentives, including restoring previous tenure and T Membership benefits for returning customers who canceled their subscription during the fee waiver period between April 19 and July 14 last year.
However, considering the scale of the damage from SK Telecom’s hacking incident, which led the company to roll out a compensation package worth about 500 billion won ($340 million) throughout the year, the current inflow of KT subscribers may only have a limited impact.
“It is unlikely that SK Telecom will recover the 40 percent market share, because even before the hacking incident, it was already hovering only marginally above the 40 percent threshold,” an industry insider said.
“The number of subscribers who exited SK Telecom since the hacking far exceeds the current KT subscriber churn; the benefit would not be enough to fully offset those earlier losses.”
Meanwhile, KT has moved to stem losses by rolling out a compensation package worth 450 billion won, including extra data, roaming benefits and free access to streaming services. However, unlike SK Telecom, the package does not include subscription fee discounts, drawing mixed reactions from its customers.