Domestic and foreign value-added telecommunications service providers including Naver, Google and Kakao removed or blocked 140,996 cases of reported illegal filmed content such as sexually fabricated videos last year, out of 185,662 reports. Reports fell 17.7 percent from a year earlier, while removals and blocks declined 22.2 percent.

The Broadcasting and Media Communications Commission on Monday released a "2025 Transparency Report" with the findings. The commission said gaps between reported cases and removals or blocks occur because reports include duplicates, cases that are not illegal filmed content and content already deleted.

Illegal filmed content refers to filmed materials, copies, edited materials, composite materials and processed materials covered by the Act on Special Cases Concerning the Punishment of Sexual Violence Crimes, and sexual exploitation of children and adolescents covered by the Act on the Protection of Children and Youth from Sexual Offenses.

The transparency report includes, by operator, items such as reported cases and processing results for illegal filmed content, efforts to prevent distribution, establishment and operation of related procedures, and the designation and training of persons responsible for preventing distribution.

Operators that submitted reports are 83 preemptive-measures obligated businesses, including value-added telecommunications service providers and web hard drive operators with at least 1 billion won in revenue or at least 100,000 average daily users. They include Naver, Kakao, Google and Meta.

Through technical measures, operators preemptively blocked more than 1 million cases of illegal filmed content and similar posts last year. The commission said the result shows that a preemptive distribution-prevention system is effective alongside post-removal and blocking.

The commission inspected whether operators that received corrective orders and administrative guidance for failing to implement technical measures last year had complied. It said all operators improved their technical measures in line with their implementation plans.

All operators subject to the transparency report completed mandatory training for persons responsible for preventing the distribution of illegal filmed content and similar material. The commission said many operators also conducted in-house employee training, alongside voluntary efforts to prevent the distribution of digital sex-crime material.

Kim Jong-cheol (김종철), chairman of the Broadcasting and Media Communications Commission, said operators' roles and responsibilities are becoming more important as digital sex crimes such as deepfake sexually fabricated videos grow more sophisticated. He said he hopes operators will faithfully implement relevant systems so preemptive distribution-prevention frameworks can operate more effectively, not only post-removal and blocking, and work to create a safe online environment.