By Don Southerton, Korea Legal.org Editor
Culminating in a recent raid on Google’s South Korean office, issues continue to surface regarding data mining, data collection (intentional and unintentional), and privacy. We’ll have to see how things unfold. BTW I like the service under scrutiny– Google’s Street View, which gives viewers street level view of a map location.
SEOUL—Police raided Google Inc.’s South Korean offices Tuesday to probe potential violations of the country’s telecommunication-privacy law, in the latest move by authorities around the world to ratchet up scrutiny of the Internet search giant’s privacy practices.
The National Police Agency said it is investigating whether the U.S. company collected and stored private information illegally while it prepared for the South Korean launch of its Street View mapping service, which provides panoramic views of streets for Internet search users.
The agency said Google collected information on unspecified users from Wi-Fi wireless network for about six months until May while sweeping through the streets in special vehicles used to assemble street photos for the service.
“We began the probe after having confirmed that the company seized and kept open data as well as unauthorized private communication data collected by its special data-collecting vehicles,” the police said in a statement. Open data refers to data such as businesses’ street addresses that can be kept and stored legally under Korean law.
“We can confirm that the police have visited Google Korea in conjunction with their investigation around data collection by Street View cars. We will cooperate with the investigation and answer any questions they have,” said Lois Kim, a Google spokeswoman.
The raid doesn’t necessarily mean the Internet search giant will face charges. Such raids are common in South Korea as part of initial investigations that often fail to go much further.
Still, the raid will likely keep a spotlight on Street View. A number of U.S. states have joined in on an investigation of whether privacy laws were broken when Google’s Street View vehicles collected personal data of unsuspecting Internet users. Authorities in the Italy, Spain, Germany and Australia are investigating the service.
Also Tuesday, Google said it plans to introduce its Street View feature for 20 of Germany’s largest cities, including Berlin, Munich and Frankfurt, before the end of the year.
At the insistence of authorities, the faces of individuals and licenses plates will be blurred. People can also ask to have images of their homes removed from the database starting next week, a move aimed at dispelling privacy fears, the Associated Press reported.
“This tool available before the launch of the service is unique to Germany,” Google spokeswoman Lena Wagner said Tuesday, according to the AP.
Google said in May that the roving vehicles it uses to create its Street View program had for years inadvertently collected data over public, unsecured Wi-Fi networks. Google has said the collection was a “mistake” but that the company “did nothing illegal.”
Google has a weak presence in the South Korean market, where local search portal sites such as NHN’s Naver, Daum Communications and others enjoy a comfortable dominance near 90% of the market.
Privacy concerns have been also emerged around Daum’s Road View, which is similar to the Street View and started January 2009. The company has taken several steps to protect privacy such as blurring people’s faces on photos.
Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704164904575421033257417518.html#ixzz0wWd0pXDR
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Practical Korean Labor Law: Some Insights
August 29th, 2010This article in Korea Times shares some great insights into Korean labor law and practices. The author, Nick Bibby, is a doctoral student in labor law at Dong-A university in Busan.
Being late isn’t just rude
Almost every day, the phone rings, or the email pings and, after the niceties, the conversation starts something like this: “My boss says he can’t afford to pay me, is that legal?”
After a few minutes figuring out the details I give the answer I could easily have given to the first question. Essentially, it’s illegal but it’s important to be practical.
Korean law is quite clear that any worker (with the exception of certain people engaged on a specific project) must be paid at least once a month ― it doesn’t matter whether the payment rate is by the hour, the day, the week, the month, or the millisecond.
That’s the important bit, here’s the practical one. Unlike the West, it’s standard in Korea for people to be paid late if the payday falls on a weekend or a national holiday. It’s also fairly routine for the first month’s salary to take its own sweet time.
Legally a salary must be paid once a month, in cash ― which means no payment in kind ― and on an agreed date. However, it’s important to keep a sense of perspective, if your pay’s delayed by 24 hours, it’s annoying but scarcely a crisis. Alternatively if, as with some cases I’ve dealt with, it’s a month, two months, or three months, then clearly it’s a different issue.
Let’s take two examples just from last week. I’ve changed the names so as to not impact any future legal proceedings. Wednesday’s case ― let’s call her Amy ― was straightforward. She was paid late and when the cash finally turned up it was the wrong amount.
Amy’s employer said that he would hold over the first 14 days worth of pay and pay it at the end of the contract. Having talked to her co-workers, Amy quickly realized that her employer had a reputation for non-payment, employment without a visa, dismissal in the 11th month and so forth.
Essentially the boss is either a crook, an idiot or both. The objective here is securing a letter of release and the outstanding money. Amy wants to stay in the country but not in the job.
Although it’s illegal for an employer to discriminate against a worker who has taken legal action against them to protect their rights, it’s usually worth trying to play nice first. The first focus is the letter of release and getting as much of the cash as possible. With both of those life gets easier. If that doesn’t work there are still options.
Critically, whether you resign or are fired (unless it’s for gross-negligence, misconduct or a criminal offense) you must be either given or paid 30 days notice. The idea that if you’re shown the door you have to race to the airport is also a myth.
Your first stop should be your nearest immigration office to extend your visa, usually a simple process. Next is to the Labor Board or, more usually, a foreign workers’ rights center or a migrant workers support organization whose staff have the language skills to handle the case for you. Legally, you must be paid, that’s the bottom line.
Let’s take case number two, let’s call him Ben. He’s due to leave the country at the start of the following week, today is Thursday. His boss has paid him but it’s short by a little over 1.5 million won. In addition, his employer wants to compel him to stay in the country. Let’s deal with the law first, Ben must be paid ― the full amount owed and on time. In addition, an employer cannot oblige a worker to extend their contract.
The question he had is can he withhold his labor until payment is made. It’s a common question and a debatable point. Technically the employer has breached the contract, so Ben would be within his rights ― payment has not been made for work that has been given.
However, whether it’s practical when you’re leaving the country in two days and would need to remain, in practice, to argue the point is another matter.
First there’s the solution mentioned above, extend the visa and fight or hand it over to a human rights organization. When you have a couple of month’s labor as a bargaining chip, it’s got leverage. When it’s a couple of days, less so. As a result the second option is probably better ― especially with his trip around Asia already planned and paid for.
In some ways the important thing is to ensure that issues like this don’t happen to other people. Forty-eight hours before you leave may be too late and a month after you arrive too early to argue a point. With a bit of planning these problems need never emerge.
There are plenty of community organizations out there, some voluntary, others commercial ― some are a bit of both. Late payment and non-payment are fraud and theft respectively. In the same way that anyone knows where their passport, wallet or bankcard is, it’s important to know where you rights are too.
Nick Bibby is deputy CEO of RightsWatch rightswatch.co.kr ― to be launched in early September) and a doctoral student in labor law at Dong-A university in Busan. He can be reached at Nick.bibby@gmail.com
Tags: Korea labor law, Korea legal, Korea legal system, Korea legal.org
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