Mobile providers won’t preserve text messages

KTF, Korea’s second-largest mobile service provider, announced yesterday that starting next year, text messages generated by its customers will not be saved by the company. “In the past, saved text messages were provided to police or prosecutors as evidence when they had subpoenas for important civil or criminal cases. However, we decided that protecting customers’ privacy should be addressed first, since it is a basic right ensured by the constitution,” said Park Sang-ho, a KTF representative. Mr. Park added that KTF’s new policy was not based on complaints from customers but rather on public opinion. “The media has been raising questions of privacy after recent investigations on cheating revealed that we keep the contents of text messages for a certain period before deleting them,” Mr. Park said. KTF’s policy had been to save all text messages generated by its customers for up to 30 days. But starting in January, the company will only record text message sender and receiver data, including dates and times, though not the actual message. Others are following suit. LG Telecom currently saves short messages up to one week. But it said it will discontinue saving text messages beginning in early January. SK Telecom said it will stop saving text messages after the ongoing exam-scandal investigation is closed. Meanwhile, the Grand National Party is pursuing a bill that would require mobile service providers to save all text-messaging traffic generated by its customers on the day the College Scholastic Ability Test is given. by Wohn Dong-hee