The number of spam messages sent to South Korean mobile phone users dropped 42.9 percent in the first half from a year earlier thanks to government and industry efforts to block junk messages, data showed Wednesday.
South Koreans received 0.24 spam texts each day on average in the January-June period, down from 0.42 messages the previous year, according to the data compiled by the Korea Communications Commission and Korea Internet Security Agency.
The decline was attributed to heightened efforts to reduce spam messages such as limiting the number of forwarded messages to 500 each day and implementing mandatory services to block such messages.
Junk messages on money loans accounted for 30.8 percent of the total, while those on gambling and adult content claimed 25.8 percent and 21 percent each, according to the data.
Meanwhile, the data showed South Koreans received an average of 1.64 spam e-mails each day.
The Korea Communications Commission, the country's communications watchdog, said it plans to bolster supervision by releasing semi-annual tallies on spam messages and setting up a monitoring system that will be used to provide real-time circulation reports to businesses. (Yonhap)