Commentary: South Korea is facing a deepfake porn crisis

ENTRENCHED GENDER BIASES

Yoon is best. The effects of this kind of digital sexual abuse can be devastating for victims because this is n’t just a prank.

Given that the incident is raging while Pavel Durov, the product’s CEO, has been arrested and charged in France for allegedly colluding with children, is the subject of a lot of blame, particularly given how well the platform is being held accountable, especially now that the platform’s CEO has been charged with child pornography. Korean officials claimed that Telegram is cooperating with the research and that it has received requests to delete articles.

However, Yoon’s words may seem dull to some given that he came to power in 2022 to win over young female voters and proposed to abolish the female equality ministry, which he claimed treated men like “potential sex criminals.”

He added that South Korea does not practice structural sex discrimination and that he made the claim that feminist was to blame for the government’s low birth rate. However, women earn some 30 per cent less than their adult counterparts, marking the highest gender wage gap in the developed world. Yet in dual-income families, people bear the brunt of housekeeping and childcare responsibilities.

Prior to the development of AI tools, advocacy organizations had been highlighting a rash of modern sex crimes, with the majority involving secret cameras or intimate photos.

There are a number of reasons why North Korean women choose not to have children, including rising child labor force participation and the uneven burden of raising children, like their counterparts in other developed nations. This hill of incredibly disturbing data might be more important to examine than to blame feminism. Surprisingly, there were 227, 000 people of one of the main Letter groups that distributed these images, which is roughly on par with the number of babies born next year.

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South Korea: The deepfake crisis engulfing hundreds of schools

BBC A hand in front of the Korean flag uses the app Telegram on a phoneBBC

Last Saturday, a Telegram text popped up on Heejin’s telephone from an unidentified receiver. Your photos and private data have been leaked, the statement read. Come discuss”.

As the college student entered the chatroom to read the message, she received a picture of herself taken a few years ago while she was still in college. It was followed by a second photograph using the same image, only this one was biologically explicit, and false.

Terrified, Heejin, which is not her real label, did not respond, but the graphics kept coming. Her face was attached to a brain engaged in a sexual act in all of them, using cutting-edge algorithmic technology.

Deepfakes, the majority of which combine a true woman’s face with a fake, sexually explicit figure, are increasingly being generated using artificial intelligence.

” I was petrified, I felt but alone”, Heejin told the BBC.

But she was not only.

Ko Narin, a North Korean journalist, had just published what would turn out to be the biggest shovel of her career two days prior. At two of the state’s top universities, it had just been revealed that police were looking into deep-fake video, and Ms Ko agreed that more must be done.

She began searching social media and discovered dozens of chat groups on the messaging apps Telegram where people shared photos of trusted people and used AI to instantly turn them into false pornographic images.

Every second, persons were sharing photos of women they knew and threatening to turn them into deepfakes, Ms Ko said.

Mr Ko discovered that these organizations were targeting college students as well. There were even areas set aside for particular middle schools and high schools. She might even be given her own area if a lot of the information was made using pictures of a certain student. Broadly labelled “humiliation areas” or “friend of friend bedrooms”, they often come with tight passage words.

South Korea has been shocked by Ms. Ko’s record in the Hankyoreh news. Following the advice of authorities in France who lately charged Telegram’s Russian leader with offences relating to the game, police announced on Monday that they were considering launching an investigation into the company. The president has called for younger people to get better educated, and the government has vowed to impose tougher sanctions on those responsible.

The BBC reached out to Telegram for reply, and while it has not yet responded to this specific situation, it has recently stated that it actively searches its website for improper activity, including child sexual abuse. It said unknown action was taken against 45, 000 parties worldwide, in August only.

A “organized and organized process”

The BBC has looked over the information of a number of these chatrooms. One requestes that users post more than four photos of people, along with their names, ages, and hometown.

” I was shocked at how organized and comprehensive the procedure was,” said Ms. Ko. The most gruesome factor I found was a group of young students at a school with more than 2, 000 members.

In the weeks after Ms Ko’s article was published, women’s rights activists started to peruse Telegram to, and follow leads.

More than 500 institutions had been identified as target by the week’s finish. The exact number impacted, and the number of subjects, is still to be established, but many are believed to be under 16, which is South Korea’s age of consent. Teens themselves make up the majority of the suspects.

Heejin claimed that becoming more concerned about how many persons might have seen her deepfakes had she learned about the magnitude of the issue. Immediately she blamed herself. Should I have been more cautious if I had been posting my photos on social media and could n’t stop thinking that this had happened?

Numerous women and youth across the nation have since deactivated their balances immediately or removed their photos from social media, fearing that their exploitation will follow.

One college student, Ah-eun, whose contemporaries have been targeted, said,” We are frustrated and angry that we are having to judge our behavior and our use of social media when we have done nothing wrong.

One target at her school was told by officers not to bother looking into her case because it would be too difficult to find the killer and because it was” not really a violence” because” the pictures were fake,” according to Ah-eun.

News 1 Protests in South Korea against the deepfake porn scandalNews 1

The messaging apps Telegram is at the center of this incident. Unlike people sites, which the regulators can obtain quickly, and then request for images get removed, Telegram is a private, encrypted messaging software.

People are often private, areas can be set to” secret” style, and their contents swiftly deleted without a trace. This has made it a perfect location for criminal activity to flourish.

Lawmakers and the officers retaliated past year with a powerful statement, promising to look into these crimes and prosecute the offenders.

Seoul National Police Agency announced on Monday that it would look into Telegram’s involvement in making available false pornographic pictures of babies.

The app’s founder, Pavel Durov, was charged in France last week with being complicit in a number of crimes related to the app, including enabling the sharing of child pornography.

Because Korea has previously experienced this crisis, women’s rights activists claim that the government in South Korea has allowed sexual abuse to continue unchecked for too long. In 2019, it became clear that a sex ring was coercing women and children into sharing sexually explicit images of themselves using Telegram.

Police at the time asked Telegram for help with their investigation, but the app ignored all seven of their requests. No action was taken against the platform because of censorship, despite the ringleader’s eventual sentence of more than 40 years in prison.

” They sentenced the main actors but otherwise neglected the situation, and I think this has exacerbated the situation”, said Ms Ko.

A blurred screenshot of the channels

Park Jihyun, who, as a young student journalist, uncovered the Nth room sex-ring back in 2019, has since become a political advocate for victims of digital sex crimes. She claimed that since the deepfake scandal broke, she has been contacted by students and parents several times a day in tears.

They are terrified because they saw their school listed on a social media list.

In South Korea, Ms. Park has been leading calls for the government to regulate or even outlaw the app. The state must regulate these tech companies to protect its citizens, she said.” If these tech companies will not cooperate with law enforcement agencies, then the state must regulate them.”

Prior to this most recent crisis, South Korea’s Advocacy Centre for Online Sexual Abuse victims (ACOSAV ) was already aware of a significant increase in the number of underage victims of deepfake porn.

In 2023 they counselled 86 victims. Without counting the final seven days, that number increased to 238 in just the first eight months of this year.

One of the centre’s leaders, Park Seonghye, said over the past week her staff had been inundated with calls and were working around the clock. ” It’s been a full scale emergency for us, like a wartime situation”, she said.

There is now so much more footage than there was before thanks to the most recent deepfake technology, and we’re worried that it will only go up.

The center works with online platforms to remove harmful content and assists victims in counseling them. According to Ms. Park, there have been instances where Telegram has removed content at users ‘ request. ” So it’s not impossible”, she noted.

Women’s rights organizations claim that this is just the most recent instance of misogyny to occur online in South Korea despite the fact that new AI technology is allowing for easier victim exploitation.

First women were the target of numerous verbal abuse online. Then came the spy cam craze, where people were allegedly secretly filmed using restrooms and changing rooms.

” The root cause of this is structural sexism and the solution is gender equality”, read a statement signed by 84 women’s groups.

Yoon Suk Yeol, the president of the nation, has denied structural sexism, cut funding for victim support groups, and reinstituted the government’s gender equality ministry.

Getty Images The Telegram messaging app is seen on an iPhone in this illustration taken on 25 August, 2024 in Warsaw, PolandGetty Images

Lee Myung-hwa, who treats young sex offenders, agreed that although the outbreak of deepfake abuse might seem sudden, it had long been lurking under the surface. ” For teenagers, deepfakes have become part of their culture, they’re seen as a game or a prank”, said the counsellor, who runs the Aha Seoul Youth Cultural Centre.

Ms. Lee argued that it was important to educate young men, citing research that found that when you expose what constitutes sexual abuse, offenders become more aware of what constitutes sexual abuse, which prevents them from reoffending.

Meanwhile, the government has announced that it will punish those who publish deepfake images and punish those who view the porn. It will also increase the criminal sentences for those who publish deepfake images.

It comes in response to criticism that not enough criminals were punished. One of the issues is that the majority of offenders are teenagers, who are typically tried in youth courts and receive more lenient sentences.

Many of the chatrooms have been shut down since the first ones were discovered, but brand-new ones are almost certain to follow. The journalists reporting on this story have already been set up in a humiliation room. Ms Ko, who broke the news, said this had given her sleepless nights. ” I keep checking the room to see if my photo has been uploaded”, she said.

In South Korea, almost every teenage girl and young woman has experienced this type of anxiety. Ah-eun, the university student, said it had made her suspicious of her male acquaintances.

” I now ca n’t be certain people wo n’t commit these crimes behind my back, without me knowing”, she said. ” I’ve become hyper-vigilant in all my interactions with people, which ca n’t be good”.

Hosu Lee and Sunwook Lee provide additional reporting.

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Commentary: Singapore goes big on parental leave. Now for fathers and employers to step up

OPTIMISM FOR CHANGE

Still, there is reason for optimism.

How parents deal with their job and caregiving obligations has changed as a result of a similar shared parental leave scheme that was introduced in the UK. Moms who took the left frequently transition from traditional “breadwinner” functions to more engaged caregiving ones, which results in a more evenly distributed load on domestic responsibilities.

It also sparked and lasted long conversations about work and care, highlighting the potential for these plans to change societal objectives where open debate and shared obligations in families are the norm.

In Sweden, “daddy restrictions” marked a pivotal time in parental leave plan. It began by granting parents a 30-day leave of absence that would be lost if left unnecessarily.

The fathers who took any parental leave rose from 44 % to 77 % after the introduction of this policy, which highlights the success of the quota in promoting gender equality. Since then, this limit has been increased to 90 times.

Closer to home, Japan, usually steeped in profoundly rooted gender roles, has even made notable achievements. The share of fathers taking childcare leave has increased significantly from 17 % in 2022 to 30 % in 2023 after extensive public awareness campaigns and system changes.

Societal norms are not eternal, they can be reshaped with dedication, friendly policies, and a shared commitment to alter.

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Thailand “reaffirms” pledge to LGBTQIA2S+

The Love Pride Parade 2024 is hosted in the Pride Month in June. (Photo: Varuth Hirunyatheb)
The Pride Month of June is when the Love Pride Parade 2024 is held. ( Photo: Varuth Hirunyatheb)

Thailand reaffirms its commitment to protecting LGBTQIA2S right by demonstrating its eagerness to submit an application for the 2025 InterPride World Conference, with goals of hosting WorldPride in 2030.

The Thailand Convention and Exhibition Bureau (TCEB ) organized the event” Unity in Action: Thailand’s Next Steps in Equality” on Tuesday to honor the landmark passage of the Marriage Equality Bill and affirm the government’s commitment to advancing gender equality in the nation.

In a keynote address titled” Towards Equality and Unity: Announcing Thailand’s Progress in Marriage Equality Legislation and Ready to Host WorldPride,” former prime minister Srettha Thavisin claimed the government’s goals are to long-term advance gender equality and ensure an inclusive culture for Thai LGBTQIA2S folks and people all over the world.

However, the government is bolstering the hospitality industry to support this plan. Through the creation of the Asia Pride Alliance, which encourages local partnership for LGBTQIA2S rights, the government wants to repeat its dedication to creating corporate partnerships across Asia, he said.

Thailand, he continued, wants to advance the LGBTQIA2S plan and support the pleasure community both regionally and globally.

He said Thailand did consider Phuket as the host city for the InterPride World Conference in 2025, adding this request shows the strong cooperation between individuals, communities, and the government, and marks a major step towards the” Road to WorldPride 2030″ plan.

Chiruit Isarangkun Na Ayuthaya, the TCEB senator, said Thailand has upheld the right of its Pleasure area.

Through engagement with InterPride member organizations and allied organizations, the state is empowering communities at the local level.

Locally, it is positioning the nation as a leader in Asia’s press for sex equality and diversity.

By highlighting its pride-friendly services and continuing efforts to develop diversity, it is promoting Thailand as a safe and welcoming place for worldwide events on a global scale.

” We are pleased to announce that we are prepared to submit an application for the 2025 InterPride World Conference. Moreover, we aspire to sponsor WorldPride in 2030.

” This marks a major milestone in our quest to becoming a worldwide LGBTQIA2S place and a hero of variety, “he added.

LGBTQIA2S stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and transgender, gay and questioning, transgender, heterosexual or agender, and two-spirit.

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Thailand “reaffirms” pledge to LGBTQ+

The Love Pride Parade 2024 is hosted in the Pride Month in June. (Photo: Varuth Hirunyatheb)
In June, the Pride Month is the time for the Love Pride Parade 2024. ( Photo: Varuth Hirunyatheb)

Thailand reaffirms its commitment to protecting LGBTQ right by demonstrating its eagerness to submit an application for the 2025 InterPride World Conference, with goals of hosting WorldPride in 2030.

The Thailand Convention and Exhibition Bureau (TCEB ) organized the event” Unity in Action: Thailand’s Next Steps in Equality” on Tuesday to honor the landmark passage of the Marriage Equality Bill and affirm the government’s commitment to advancing gender equality in the nation.

Former prime minister Srettha Thavisin delivered a presentation address titled” Towards Equality and Unity: Announcing Thailand’s Progress in Marriage Equality Legislation and Ready to Host WorldPride,” in which he claimed the government aims to foster gender equality over the long term and ensure an equitable society for Thai LGBTQ people and individuals everywhere.

However, the government is bolstering the hospitality industry to support this plan. Through the creation of the Asia Pride Alliance, which encourages local partnership for LGBTQ rights, the government wants to repeat its dedication to creating corporate partnerships across Asia, he said.

Thailand aims to expand the LGBTQ plan and support the satisfaction community at both the local and global levels, he continued.

He said Thailand did consider Phuket as the host city for the InterPride World Conference in 2025, adding this request shows the strong cooperation between individuals, communities, and the government, and marks a major step towards the” Road to WorldPride 2030″ plan.

Chiruit Isarangkun Na Ayuthaya, the TCEB senator, said Thailand has upheld the right of its Pleasure area.

Through engagement with InterPride member organizations and allied organizations, the state is empowering communities at the local level.

Locally, it is positioning the nation as a leader in Asia’s press for sex equality and diversity.

By highlighting its pride-friendly services and continuing efforts to develop diversity, it is promoting Thailand as a safe and welcoming place for worldwide events on a global scale.

” We are pleased to announce that we are prepared to submit an application for the 2025 InterPride World Conference. Also, we aspire to sponsor WorldPride in 2030.

” This marks a major milestone in our quest to becoming a worldwide LGBTQ place and a hero of variety, “he added.

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Africa’s population boom: challenges, opportunities – Asia Times

Africa’s population may continue to rise swiftly over the next few decades, mainly in the Sahel. While this pattern has both perks and downsides, it has a substantial impact on global operations. Specifically, Africa’s demographic increase may be among the factors behind local issues, food vulnerability and unrestrained movement.

The data are emphatic: by 2050, Africa’s entire population may increase to about 2.5 billion, an impressive get compared with 1.36 billion inhabitants in 2023. In less than 80 times, one out of every two children abroad will be African.

The good news is that the higher proportion of people in the workforce benefits American nations and the rest of the world. However, a larger proportion of young people puts added social and security risks and economic burdens on institutions.

The problem is that many African countries may struggle to meet their meal manufacturing goals as a result of the population growth. Nigeria and Ethiopia are currently the top two countries in the world with the highest number of children who are malnourished. Four of the top five are located in Africa right now.

Despite one five of Africa’s people being undernourished, the area is not any closer to achieving the goal of eradicating poverty. On average, African governments allocate just 3.8 % of their budgets to crops, while some have cut their spending in recent years.

Africa: peninsula of hope and melancholy

” Looking at Africa requires diversity and knowledge of living conditions that are fundamentally different from Europe”, Rudolf G. Adam, a security analyst at the Liechtenstein-based GIS, told this writer.

” Africa is giant. The Arabic-Islamic North and the South have a lot of variations. The length between Cairo and Johannesburg is the same as Beijing and Ankara.

” To grasp Africa, both relative and absolute numbers issue, above all the relation to Europe. In 1950, Europe ( excluding Ukraine and Turkey ) had about 400 million people, Africa 100 million. Now, these images read 500 million and 1.000 million. In 2050, they will be 500 million and about 2.500 million. That implies: A relation of 4: 1 is changing into 1: 5 within one decade. Migrant pressure is bound to fall, “he said.

Nigeria will have about 400 million people in 2050, which is more than the US; however, there could be 650 million in 2100, making it the third-most populous nation after China and India, with about 700 per square km, making that number nearly twice as many people as Haiti. Does this create comparable social and political conditions?

” Africa has fantastic success and abject poverty. Money disparity is one of the main problems in many countries”, the professional continued.

” Population development is very unevenly distributed. South Africa, accounting for about 40 % of the productivity of the entire continent, has a shrinking population – a terrible consequence of AIDS ( as has Botswana ). The highest development costs are in countries with weak economy and delicate surroundings, especially in the Sahel zone”, Adam added.

Problems and violence

As of 2023, sub-Saharan Africa was considered to be the world’s violence hotspot, accounting for around 50 % of all victims killed in the previous month. Radical aggressive organizations that are active in the Sahel are getting more powerful, threatening to infect Africa.

Among the most dangerous ones are the Islamic State-Sahel Province, the Islamic State in the West American Province, and Jama’at Nasr al-Islam al Muslimin. The latter was labeled by the Economist in 2022 as the country’s fastest-growing terrorist party.

Although populations are seen as a supplementary issue, aggressive conflict is more likely to result in African countries with faster population growth. According to the UN experts, hunger, thirst, and unemployment create a conducive environment for the growth of criminal organizations.

The selection of kids by terrorists is of particular concern. Children make up more than half of the entire people in each of the nations affected by the Boko Haram attacks.

Unregulated migration

Migration is a significant source of labor, which benefits both the sponsor and the countries of origin. The latter benefit financially as foreign workers help to fill workers gaps, while the latter profit from remittances sent by immigrants.

In the meantime, despite all the drawbacks, movement can cause significant hazards. The number of illegal African refugees has been steadily rising in recent years, according to the Africa Center record.

The majority of refugees are one, young Africans who are primarily moving to urban areas on the continent. However, a part of these choose Europe and the Middle East as sites. According to the 2024 World Migration Report, there have been more than two more Africans residing outside the region since 1990, with Europe witnessing the biggest improve.

What to do

The universe is aware of the problem, and some powerful efforts are now live. West African nations established the Ouagadougou Partnership ( OP) in 2011 to advance family planning. 1.18 million more African girls have used contemporary contraception in the last ten years thanks to the OP work.

Women’s autonomy and gender equality are another appealing field of work. This approach kills two birds with one rock, which is what makes it so intriguing. On the one hand, a greater number of educated working women refers to the country’s economic growth, on the other, compelled women usually have fewer children.

According to Adam, “if the developed world wants American countries to foliage and to stop an always rising and excessive exodus, it will need to get more engaged directly to create green, interesting perspectives for the idealistic to stay and to build a better future for themselves and for their countries.” ” At the moment, Africa is still looked upon as a cheap reservoir from which to meet outside demands: food, minerals, energy, and qualified personnel ( doctors )”.

” Better birth control may be a key to wealth and social stability”, the professional noted. ” For Europe, the future of the Sahel area will be important. At the moment, Russia and China seem to be gaining a hold it. Africa deserves more attention. It is great time to give it more prominence worldwide. That requires, above all, looking at the globe with a separating eye”.

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Island picked for Pride bid

Island picked for Pride bid

In a bid to host the 2025 InterPride World Conference, Thailand has chosen Phuket as its representative.

In a conference titled” Town Hall: Nationwide Pride Episode 2,” the area state defeated Chiang Mai and Khon Kaen, both of which had different chances.

It was a gathering of Thailand-based Pride organizers organized by the Thailand Convention and Exhibition Bureau (TCEB ) and the Foundation for SOGI ( sexual orientation and gender identity ) Rights and Justice.

Phuket may be chosen for the October edition of the InterPride World Conference in Columbia.

The five-day InterPride World Conference is held annually. Around 600 Pleasure organizations from 70 nations come to the event to talk about the state of the LGBTQ movement and talk about their experience achieving gender equality.

Since 1982, the meeting has been held. The majority of the locations were in North America and Europe.

According to TCEB President Chiruit Isarangkun Na Ayuthaya, if Thailand is chosen as the next location, it will be the first moment the conference will be held in Asia.

Sophon Suwannarat, the governor of Phuket, recently claimed that the area received a significant amount of money from two occasions held during Pride Month in June. LGBTQ guests are considered a group of superior tourists with large saving power, he said.

WorldPride in 2030 is another occasion the state wants Thailand to network.

It is among the most important occasions for LGBTQ worldwide, hosted by InterPride, said Mr Chiruit. It is anticipated to draw a sizable crowd of people who did invest a lot of money in Thailand.

According to Mr. Chiruit, the Australian WorldPride function last year attracted about 1 million members and generated a sizable income for the region.

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Phuket bids for 2025 InterPride

Phuket bids for 2025 InterPride
People took part in the Phuket Pride Month celebration next month. ( Photo: Achathaya Chuenniran )

Officials in Phuket claim that the area is then prepared to compete for the 2025 InterPride World Conference.

On Wednesday, Governor Sophon Suwannarat led the signing ceremony of the Pride & Equality Phuket memorandum of understanding ( MoU), which was attended by representatives from both the public and private sectors of the island.

According to Mr Sophon, the MoU emphasizes raising awareness about sex diversity, providing security to people in the LGBTQ society, and reducing sex discrimination on the island.

Mr. Sophon even mentioned that Chiang Mai and Khon Kaen are preparing to contend for the province’s position as the host nation for the upcoming InterPride World Conference.

The InterPride World Conference is a five-day yearly event that draws between 700 and 800 members from 70 nations. The event aims to talk about the state of LGBTQ actions and talk about achieving gender equality. The state is anticipated to make up to 1.1 billion ringgit from the event.

The Thailand Convention and Exhibition Bureau (TCEB), the government’s firm, is expected to choose the municipal power, according to Mr. Sophon, because the state is prepared to sponsor gender-inclusive activities.

The celebration held during Pride Month showcased the preparation of the occasion company, using the two Pride activities on June 9 and 29 as perfect cases, he said.

Additionally, the events provided a significant revenue for the island because LGBTQ visitors are viewed as high-quality tourists with higher spending power, according to Mr. Sophon.

” We hope Phuket may be chosen on July 11″, said Mr Sophon.

Kongsak Khoopongsakorn, chairman of the Phuket Chamber of Commerce, said that the Pride &amp, Equality Phuket MoU demonstrated the region’s readiness to host the InterPride World Conference second time. The event may help improve the region’s market, he added.

Both Pride activities on the island exhibited strategic commitments from the local community and related sectors, according to Federation of Andaman Region Industries chair Chernporn Kanjanasaya.

Anupab Vejwanichsanong, vice president of the Provincial Administration Organisation ( PAO ) of Phuket, voiced the PAO’s support for organising the international conference.

Since 1982, there has n’t been a single InterPride World Conference. The majority of the sponsoring locations were in North America and Europe, with nobody in Asia. It will be the first time the meeting is held in Asia, if Thailand is chosen as the next host country for the 2018 convention in Colombia in October, according to TCEB.

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