Korean businesses, financial institutions and government agencies have been frequently targets of hacking in the past. It is like an epidemic. The latest case involves SK Communications, which runs the Cyworld social networking website and the Nate online portal.The hackers, whose attacks reportedly originated in China, stole personal information of 35 million clients of Cyworld and Nate last week

August, a sultry month for holidaymaking, may not be amenable to engaging in heated political deals. But that is what lawmakers are required to do, with the National Assembly statutorily required to open a special session on each even-numbered month prior to September when a 100-day regular session starts.Moreover, the National Assembly needs to act on as many pending bills as possible during the

The inter-Korean nuclear talks held in Indonesia on Friday were the first step toward the resumption of full-fledged, six-way talks on Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program. It had previously been agreed that Pyongyang would talk first with Seoul and later with Washington before the six-way talks, stalled since December 2008, would resume.Given the affirmative assessment of the Friday talks by the S

Japan’s Foreign Ministry has perplexed us by ordering its officials not to use Korean Air for a month starting today. The reason for this ban was a demonstration flight the private airliner recently conducted with its newly introduced Airbus A380 over Dokdo, Korea’s easternmost islets.One may wonder why the Japanese ministry instructed a boycott of the Korean carrier for test flying its newest pas

South Korea and China have agreed to restore bilateral military relations, which have remained sour following North Korea’s torpedoing of the South’s warship Cheonan in March last year and subsequent shelling of Yeonpyeong Island in October. The agreement was reached between Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin and his Chinese counterpart Liang Guanglie during their talks in Beijing on Friday.According t

A family comprising parents and two children has long been the Korean household prototype. But households are changing like everything else. A recent census has proven that model to be outdated. The new findings demand a change in housing, welfare and other government policies that are focused on the outdated prototype.In 2000, households of four people ― mostly parents and children ― accounted fo

Acts of physical abuse committed out of personal malice and those of harsh discipline administered without being sanctioned are prevalent in the barracks. One report comes after another about enlisted men being humiliated, beaten up, sexually abused or ill treated in other ways. But the military authorities have taken few effective measures to prevent them.A report from the Ministry of National De

Chaebol owners have long sought to transfer their wealth to their children without paying taxes. One way they have developed in recent years is to have their group affiliates place sweet deals on companies controlled by their children. It is a clever way to siphon-off corporate wealth to line the pockets of chaebol siblings.According to a report released by the Economic Reform Research Institute,

On Thursday, the government unveiled the economy management plan for the second half. Minister of Strategy and Finance Bahk Jae-wan said the government would put the policy focus on stabilizing the livelihoods of ordinary people. To this end, Bahk said, the government would tamp down on inflation, create jobs, boost domestic demand and strengthen the social safety net.The government’s new economic

The presidential office is at odds with the ruling Grand National Party, which is abandoning much of its conservative tenet ahead of next year’s elections. But it has few tools to use against the move.Fatigue is settling among presidential aides, who find it virtually impossible to force the party to toe the line, unlike at the outset of President Lee Myung-bak’s administration. They apparently fe

The prosecution and the police are again clashing over the right to investigate crimes. The old conflict between the two law-enforcement agencies has been reignited as a parliamentary special committee on judicial reform is set to revise the laws defining their relationship.At the heart of the dispute is a clause in the Criminal Procedure Act requiring police officers to investigate crimes under t

Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon announced Friday that his metropolitan government has begun to take steps to hold a referendum on free school lunches. The referendum was requested by a coalition of conservative civic groups opposed to the controversial free meal program launched by the city’s education office in March.The coalition, dubbed the National Anti-Populism Union, submitted Thursday more than 800,

The central bank’s commitment to putting inflationary pressure under control sounds credible at long last. It sounds convincing not because it hints at another benchmark rate hike next month after a 25-basis-point increase to 3.25 percent last weekend. Rather, much of the credibility comes from the administration, which promises to take all measures possible to rein in inflationary pressure.Friday

The government has come up with a set of measures to curb the deeply entrenched practice of high-ranking bureaucrats descending into high-paying private-sector jobs immediately after their retirement. The package allows ministers, vice ministers, assistant ministers and heads of provincial governments to take a private sector job immediately after retirement. But it bans them from work that is clo

Prosecutors investigating the irregularities at Busan Savings Bank abruptly suspended their probe Friday. They sent testifiers home and walked out of their offices. They did not come to work on Saturday or Sunday either. It was a protest against a decision by lawmakers to abolish the prosecution’s most powerful investigation unit -- the Central Investigation Department of the Supreme Prosecutors’

The proposed judicial reform is in danger of being shipwrecked in the face of opposition from the legal profession. Political activists will do well to join hands in efforts to rescue it.Under pressure from judges, prosecutors and lawyers, the special committee on judicial reform is moving to terminate its operation at the end of June, as scheduled, though it is necessary to extend it because fina

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il is visiting China again, accompanied by his top economic officials. It is the reclusive and ailing leader’s third visit to China in a short span of one year, with the previous two visits made in May and August last year. Kim’s frequent visits to China indicate Pyongyang has made little progress in tackling its deepening economic, political and social problems. The p

The government has launched an investigation into the allegations that U.S. Forces Korea buried tons of Agent Orange at Camp Carrol in Waegwan, about 30 km north of Daegu, in 1978. The Ministry of Environment sent an inspection team to the camp area Friday to verify whether the claims, put forward by three U.S. veterans who served at the military base, are true. The three veterans told a U.S. TV s

Rep. Kim Jin-pyo, new floor leader of the main opposition Democratic Party, vows to drub the ruling party in the parliamentary elections scheduled for next April. But he has much work to do with his counterpart from the ruling party before going on the stump together with Rep. Sohn Hak-kyu, the leader of his party. On being elected floor leader on Friday, Kim, a second-term lawmaker from Suwon, Gy

Lawmakers of the ruling Grand National Party are taking another crack at curbing the time-old practice of public officials landing high-paying jobs at private companies immediately after retirement. The latest attempt comes in the midst of public anger over officials of the Financial Supervisory Service who have all but monopolized the auditor posts at financial companies after retirement.To addre