The Korea Internet Companies Association published its '2025 Internet Industry Regulation White Paper' on Tuesday, analysing South Korea's digital industry and regulatory environment.

The white paper said 2024 domestic internet industry revenue rose 9.0 percent from a year earlier to 718.8 trillion won. That was about 28 percent of South Korea's nominal gross domestic product of 2,557 trillion won. It was above the average revenue growth rate of 5.2 percent for all industries.

Employment rose 9.2 percent from a year earlier to 2,167,000, exceeding the overall industry average growth rate of 1.1 percent. The white paper analysed this as the result of an expansion of data-based service industries linking production, distribution, finance and content industries, alongside the spread of artificial intelligence (AI) software and services.

An assessment of internet industry regulation legislation found many cases where definitions of regulatory targets were unclear or links to the existing legal system were not organised. In key groups of laws, including the e-commerce law, bills related to online platforms, the Information and Communications Network Act and the Telecommunications Business Act, more than half of the assessed bills fell into a low-rated group of 25 points or less.

Companies showed a tendency to take a cautious approach to reviewing new service development and business expansion, or to delay decision-making, due to prolonged regulatory discussions. An opinion was raised that increased input of legal and administrative staff could affect research and development (R&D) activities.

The white paper recommended an approach that considers the structure connecting platforms, content, data, small merchants and users. It said regulation related to the digital industry needs to review in advance, at the design stage, the industry impact, technological change and consistency with existing systems.

Park Sung-ho (박성호), the association's chairman, said the internet industry has established itself as a foundation for economic growth in terms of sales and employment. He said a regulatory policy environment is needed that takes into account industrial structure and the pace of technological change.