The main opposition Democratic United Party (DUP) on Wednesday refuted allegations that the personal information of more than 42,000 of its members was leaked, saying the data was mostly readily available and concerned a far smaller number of people.
The denial comes a day after police in South Gyeongsang Province said they found the party's membership list on a computer of a Seoul-based event planner that organizes various gatherings in the region. Party membership lists are closely guarded secrets and never released to outsiders.
DUP Chairman Lee Hae-chan was quoted earlier in the day as ordering "strict censure and disciplinary action" for anyone found responsible for the alleged leak.
"We confirmed with police in South Gyeongsang Province that they found a list of 27,000 party members, not 42,000," DUP secretary general Rep. Yun Ho-jung told a news conference.
That list contained the names of 23,000 delegates who attended the party's national convention on Jan. 15, 1,500 people who were elected in the June 2010 local elections and 2,000 members of local councils, among others, Yun said.
The person accused of leaking the list to the event planner was a former official of a party that later became the DUP, he said, adding that anyone who had worked as a party official could easily access the data.
The party also found that the former party official transferred the list to the head of the event-planning company while working together to win a contract to plan events for the World Traditional Medicine Expo to be held in the province next year.
"The transferred file has not been used for other purposes until now," Yun said.
The company came under police investigation on suspicion of involvement in alleged irregularities surrounding the selection of an event planner for the Expo.
Police said it is not yet clear whether the list was used for political purposes ahead of last April's general elections or the upcoming presidential election in December. Company officials were quoted as telling police they secured it as reference material for their business.
The revelations come only months after prosecutors indicted six people, including two officials of the ruling Saenuri Party, on charges of leaking and selling the ruling party's membership list ahead of April's parliamentary elections.
Rep. Hong Il-pyo, a spokesman of the Saenuri Party, meanwhile, said in a statement that the DUP, which criticized the ruling party in the past, should now take "strict measures" against its own leak.
He also called on the rival party to join the Saenuri Party in its efforts to better protect the personal information of party members.
(Yonhap)