A copycat crime, known as the "Doctor's Room", (박사방; 博士房; baksabang) was operated by a man using the screen name Doctor (박사; Baksa, later identified as Cho Ju-bin[4][5]), who is accused of blackmailing dozens of women, forcing them to take sexually exploitative videos, with some involving rape.
[10][11] It was revealed that the victims' pictures were shared and sold to over 260,000 IDs (narrowed down to about 60,000 users, taking into consideration overlapping profiles)[12] and were paid for anonymously in cryptocurrency.
In addition, a high school student in Incheon was running various Telegram chatting rooms that distributed child abuse and sexual assault towards children, links for buying drugs and also shared tricks on how to deal with police investigations.
For instance, the Seoul Shinmun, through undercover journalism, found a secret Telegram room distributing child abuse and sexual assault towards children in January.
In the same manner, Sisa Journal in April that year reported that Telegram was being used as a platform for sharing illegal pictures and videos.
[19] The lead operator Baksa was arrested, but his accomplice and Telegram users who shared the videos for money remain unknown.
[22] On March 23, 2020, the Seoul Broadcasting System disclosed the identity of the "Doctor's Room" suspect[24] Cho Ju-bin.
Jeon was indicted on suspicion of operating an Internet site featuring illegal recordings and sentenced to an imprisonment of 3 years and 6 months by the prosecution.
The Supreme Court of South Korea also announced its plans to make sentences harsher on digital sex crimes following public outcry.
As of March 1, National Police Agency Commissioner General Min Gap-ryong released a video clip and a full text of the answers to the petition.
On January 15, 2020, 100,000 people agreed to the National Assembly's petition for international cooperation with police, the establishment of a digital sex crime department, raising sentencing standards for digital sex crimes, and the National Assembly's Legislation and Judiciary Committee on February 10.
It has been revealed that despite the provision of related data books, the remarks made in the process have been controversial, with more than a month of information not being properly identified.
On the afternoon of March 24, National Police Agency Commissioner General Min Gap-ryong and Gender Equality and Family Minister Lee Jung-ok responded to the petition, and promised to set up a special digital sex crime investigation headquarters and prepare digital sex crime sentencing standards.
For example, in regards to the "Nth room case", women wanting to become models are given job offers through social media, leading to them taking pornographic imagery of themselves.
[39] The sentence was upgraded to 42 years in prison in October 2021, according to the Netflix documentary Cyber Hell: Exposing an Internet Horror.
It also reported that by collaborating with cryptocurrency companies, 3,757 people linked to the Nth Room crimes have been arrested as of December 2020, of whom 245 have been imprisoned.