{"id":36585,"date":"2019-03-21T12:25:46","date_gmt":"2019-03-21T12:25:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=36585"},"modified":"2019-03-21T12:25:46","modified_gmt":"2019-03-21T12:25:46","slug":"south-korea-accuses-4-in-spycam-scandal-involving-800-couples","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=36585","title":{"rendered":"South Korea accuses 4 in spycam scandal involving 800 couples"},"content":{"rendered":"
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South Korean<\/a>\u00a0police\u00a0have accused four men of using illegal spy cameras at motels to film and livestream videos of more than 800 couples in one of the largest-scale examples of the country’s spycam epidemic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Police said on Thursday that\u00a0the men installed tiny cameras – all of them with a lens just one millimetre wide – in 42 rooms in 30 motels, hidden inside hairdryer holders, wall sockets and digital TV boxes.<\/p>\n

They then livestreamed the footage 24 hours a day to a subscription website with about 4,000 members, hosted on an overseas server.<\/p>\n

Some viewers also paid a 50,000 won ($44) monthly supplement for access to “exclusive” content – edited highlights available on repeat, according to the AFP news agency.<\/p>\n

More than 800 couples were shown on the site over three months, mostly having sex, police said.<\/p>\n

“It was the first case we caught where videos were broadcast live online,” they said in a statement.<\/p>\n

The gang earned about seven million won ($6,203) from the scheme, police said.<\/p>\n

‘Molka’ videos<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The hyper-wired South has been battling the increasingly widespread proliferation of so-called “molka”, or spycam videos, which largely involve men secretly filming women in schools and toilets, among other places.<\/p>\n

The latest case is unusual for involving couples and the livestreaming element.<\/p>\n

More than 5,400 were arrested for spycam-related crimes in South Korea in 2017, but fewer than two percent were jailed.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month K-pop singer Jung Joon-young\u00a0<\/span>who rose to fame after coming second in one of South Korea’s top talent shows admitted<\/a> secretly filming himself having sex and sharing the footage.<\/p>\n

Jung appeared at a court hearing on Thursday on whether an arrest warrant will be issued on allegations he shared sexually explicit videos without consent. A courtr decision is expected Thursday night or Friday.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

Last year, Seoul several times witnessed tens thousands of women protesting against spycam videos as part of the country’s #MeToo movement, demanding stricter punishment by the government.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In South Korea, motels are a relatively affordable option for many travellers from home and overseas, and a popular destination for couples seeking privacy away from parents or other family members.<\/p>\n

But they have also long been associated with illicit sex business and crime.<\/p>\n

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\nThe scheme used tiny cameras hidden in hairdryer holders, wall sockets and TV boxes\u00a0<\/span>[Yonhap\/AFP]<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Korean\u00a0police\u00a0have accused four men of using illegal spy cameras at motels to film and livestream videos of more than 800 couples in one of the largest-scale examples of the country’s spycam epidemic. Police said on Thursday that\u00a0the men installed tiny cameras – all of them with a lens just one millimetre wide – in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=36585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36585\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=36585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=36585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=36585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}