Personal data of foreign teachers exposed on recruiter sites, raising privacy concerns

Personal information belonging to Allison Hall, a 30-year-old American teaching English in Korea, is displayed on a recruiting website. The information includes personal details such as her birthday and marital status. Captured from recruiting website

In 2023, Allison Hall, a 30-year-old American teaching English in Korea, discovered that her friends’ personal information had been posted online.

It was only the beginning.

The following year, Hall — then chair of the Native Teachers’ Union under the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions — found similar posts exposing union members’ personal details on a recruiting website, with the information accessible even without a login and easily downloaded. Private English language academies in Korea often rely on these sites to hire teachers.

To test the system, Hall signed up using outdated information. Her details appeared that same day.

Last year, a friend told Hall that another recruiter had begun posting even more sensitive data about teachers. She repeated the test and her information was posted within a week.

“All of my information was posted. My face, my name, my work experience, my age, my race, my gender, my home address, including the room number. Everything was exposed,” Hall told The Korea Times. “When I saw it, I froze in panic and felt a cold chill through my veins.”

The cases underscore growing concerns that some recruiter-run websites in Korea are publicly exposing foreign teachers’ personal data — often without clear consent — under the guise of standard industry practice, which lawyers argue may violate the Personal Information Protection Act.

On one recruiting website, anyone can browse teacher profiles that include photographs, educational histories, birth dates, work records and even whether the teacher has tattoos. On another recruiter’s web community, full access requires membership. Yet even publicly visible thumbnails reveal names, current and desired salaries and visa status. Some posts also include appearance-based remarks, such as “She looks pretty.”

Screenshot of a recruiter’s web community listing information about native English teachers, including visa type, educational background and remarks such as “She looks pretty” / Captured from the recruiter's Naver cafe

When asked by The Korea Times whether they had teachers’ consent before posting the information online, both agencies declined to give a clear answer, saying they would remove the posts upon request.

One agency said the information was meant for directors of private English cram schools and described the practice as a long-standing industry practice to facilitate job placements between teachers and academies.

“We place native English teachers with hagwon directors, but they often review the site on their own before contacting us,” an employee of one recruiting agency said.

It added that there is no formal process for obtaining explicit consent — a gap that could leave some teachers feeling their privacy has been violated — but said that most register on the site themselves.

Hall reported one of the websites to authorities. The Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA) is investigating the case and has ordered corrective action.

“There appeared to be violations, so we issued written administrative guidance requiring revisions,” a KISA investigator handling the case said.

Another foreign teacher in Korea, who spoke on condition of anonymity, recently reported a similar case of third-party disclosure.

“While job searching, I found that candidate profile pages on a recruiter platform were publicly accessible without any login. The search page also included a nationality filter, allowing candidates to be filtered by country and nationality, which I consider concerning,” the teacher said.

The teacher said the profiles displayed high-risk personal data and that because the pages were public, the information could be harvested online, making removal harder and increasing harm.

“My immediate reaction was anger and concern, mainly because the exposure appeared preventable with basic access controls,” the teacher said.

The teacher reported the issue through official channels, including KISA, but weeks later was told the case would be closed because a separate report on the same issue had already been filed.

Lawyers say the practice may constitute a legal violation.

“Even without full details, disclosing identifiable information such as a person’s name or age without consent is a clear breach of the law,” said Hong Hye-in, a lawyer at the public interest law group Duroo.

Choi Jung-kyu, a lawyer who chairs the diversity communication and mediation committee at the Gyeonggi Institute of Research and Policy Development for Migrants’ Human Rights, said that even if personal information is needed by an agency for job placement, providing it remains problematic without consent for third-party disclosure.

“Job seekers may anticipate that some of their information will be shared, but making it widely accessible in this way goes beyond what an agency can reasonably use for recruitment,” Choi said, adding that the practice reflects companies’ prioritization of convenience.