Fears of having telephones wiretapped are spreading throughout government agencies including the National Police Agency, Public Prosecutors' Office, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) and Cheong Wa Dae, according to recent telephone poll by Chosun Ilbo with Mbizon.com released Sunday. Senior officials of the Ministry of Justice and the prosecutor's office in handling sensitive matters use cell phones instead of wired phones to discuss them, while NIS workers consider two to three mobile phones, a necessity.
The poll on wiretapping of 505 people over 20 years old on November 28 showed that 73.7% of respondents felt concern over possible wiretaps of their phones, nearly double that of a survey by Hyundai Research in September 1999 that showed 38.0% had fears on possible exposure of their private lives.
Some 8.9% of respondents said they had evidence that their phones had been tapped, a steep increase since 1999's 4.7%, while 46.7% of said they felt they were being overheard on the phone.
As a result of these fears, however, an unexpected silver lining has been revealed for private security companies. A manager of Hankuk Spyzone said this year there were three to four requests for wiretaps a day on average. "Last year from January to September there were 305 warrant requests but this year it has ballooned to 662," he noted.
Security company S1 has seen its business grow 20% year-on-year and its communications team created in 1998 has 100 fixed customers. Kumsong Security said that this year it has screened 150 clients, while Hankuk Business Security claims to have carried out 400 searches so far this year.
Early this year, a famous hotel in Seoul screened its Conference Room following customer complaints and found six electronic eaves dropping devices.
Big businesses such as Samsung and LG have their own security teams and regularly screen directors offices, conference rooms and laboratories. LG Electronics has bought five counter measures devices at W50 million apiece, and a manager there noted that every year they uncover bugs planted in the company's buildings.
Chief of Psychiatry at Asan medical center Kim Chang-yoon noted that such fears could develop into an obsessive neurosis such as paranoia, something he has seen among an increasing number of patient referrals.
(Choe Yoo-sik, finder@chosun.com)
