South Korea’s social media and online community are divided over a fan who was caught using a hidden camera at a GFriend fan event.
On Friday, GFriend’s Yerin caught a fan who was secretly filming her with a pair of glasses fitted with a hidden digital camera at the group’s fan event held in Seoul.
While sitting opposite the man, whose identity remains unknown, Yerin noticed something was strange about his chunky black horn-rimmed glasses.
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She persuaded the man to take the glasses off, saying she wanted to see his eyes better.
With a quick check of the inner rims of the glasses, Yerin confirmed that the eyewear contained a hidden camera.
Without making any fuss, she finished the session with the fan. But as soon as he moved from her desk, Yerin reported him to her manager.
A number of fans are lauding the starlet on her clever and brave move, but some questioned the difference between filming with a regular camera at such fan events and the spy glasses.
“It wasn’t as if he was trying to get a peeping-tom shots of their underwear,” said one Twitter user. “He did what he did because he was a fan.”
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Spy glasses are increasingly used by some fans to secretly record stars at concerts and events where photography and video recording are not allowed.
However, GFriend’s event did not ban fans from taking photographs of the stars.
Most of the group’s female fans sympathize with the star.
“That some people are blaming Yerin for ‘taking things too personally’ just shows how female celebrities are wrongly perceived and treated in the popular culture,” said another Twitter user. “What this man did was pure creepy.”
EXO’s Chen and Oh My Girl have also reportedly experienced similar acts of secret filming.
By Lim Jeong-yeo (kaylalim@heraldcorp.com)