Social media services slammed for poor privacy protection

By Kim Tong-hyung

Staff reporter

Internet company SK Communications found itself hammered by bloggers and digital rights advocates after attempting to change its privacy policies.

The company, which provides immensely popular Cyworld (www.cyworld.com) social media services and Nate-On instant messengers, is now saying it has scrapped its earlier plan to require customers to submit the media access control (MAC) addresses of their computers.

It had previously claimed that the measure was inevitable for better protecting its services from identity theft, fraud and other cyber crimes. Users, however, were worried that the collection of MAC addresses would allow an uncomfortably close monitoring of their Web behavior and could lead to serious ramifications should an SK Communications server somehow be compromised by hackers.

The MAC address, a unique identifier assigned to network interface cards, is the equivalent of social security codes for computing devices. The tracking of MAC addresses allows for the detection of a computer’s location and the websites it has accessed.

Although financial service firms and online game publishers have been collecting the MAC addresses of their users to beef their protection of electronic transactions, Internet users resisted social media services doing the same.

SK Communications was apparently alarmed by the backlash from bloggers, who filled their Twitter pages and popular message boards with posts urging Cyworld and Nate-On users to quit. Cyworld, which has more than 25 million users, is the country’s most popular social media service, while Nate-On is the most frequently used instant messenger with more than 30 million subscribers.

“We started out with good intentions to provide a better security environment for our users, but we obviously failed to predict the user concerns. We will be more thoughtful when we plan our next changes in consumer policies,” said an SK Communications spokesman.

Korean Internet companies have already been accused of collecting excessive personal information from users, as well as for ineptitude in protecting it. Websites such as Naver (www.naver.com), Daum (www.daum.net) and SK Communications’ Nate (www.nate.com) require their users to submit their resident registration numbers or other verifiable personal information, not only for e-commerce functions, but also for simple services like e-mail and blogging.

However, the country’s vulnerable security environment has meant that resident registration numbers — a 13-digit code that indicates birth date, sex and registration site — no longer remain as private information the moment they put it onto the Internet.

The exposure of Korean resident registration numbers has become so frequent that a recent police report said that Chinese hackers are trading the codes for just 1 won each, as it doesn’t take much sophistication to locate a resident registration number on Google.

“They have been collecting our names, resident registration numbers, phone numbers and Internet protocol (IP) addresses already. Just how much more do they need?” wrote a popular technology blogger, who goes by the pen name Loved Web.

네티즌, 소셜 네트워킹 사이트 개인정보 보호 소홀 비난

인터넷 회사 SK 커뮤니케이션스가 개인정보 수집정책을 바꾸려고 하다가 네티즌의 집단 반발로 인해 무산되었다.

싸이월드는 지난 21일 유저의 장소와 사용 기기 등의 정보가 수록된 MAC주소를 수집한다고 공지했다.

이와 관련 네티즌들은 이 같은 정보수집이 악용될 수 있다며 싸이월드를 블로그, 트위터등 매체에서 비난했고 일부는 집단 탈퇴를 감행하며 강력히 반발했다.

결국 SK커뮤니케이션스는 27일 올린 공지에서 "수집에 대한 고객과의 커뮤니케이션이 부족했다"며 이번 방침을 철회하겠다고 밝혔다.

한편, 국내 인터넷 회사들은 이미 유저들의 주민등록번호 등 정보 과잉 수집 관련 비난을 받은 바 있다.