A Study on the Analysis of and Educational Solution for Digital Sex Crimes in Korea

Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2023 Jan 30;20(3):2450. doi: 10.3390/ijerph20032450.

Abstract

With the development and spread of information and communication technology, our society is experiencing side effects of digital culture while also benefiting from various digital cultures. Representative side effects have spread significantly, including Internet addiction, copyright infringement, personal information infringement, and digital sex crimes. Digital sex crimes are very serious crimes, and we must find their causes and strongly prevent and deal with them at the social level. In this study, the causes and routes of occurrence of digital sex crimes in Korea are analyzed using statistics on digital sex crimes at the national level over the past four years. The statistical analysis results are as follows. First, the main victims of digital sex crimes are women in their teens and twenties, though the number of male victims is steadily increasing. Second, illegal filming is the most common type of digital sex crime, but it is not statistically significant. In other words, various digital sex crimes are occurring evenly. Third, the relationship between the victim and the perpetrator demonstrates the most temporary relationship, and there is no significant correlation between direct and indirect recognition with respect to the route of crime recognition. Finally, deletion by a digital platform is the highest for adult sites compared to other platforms. Based on these analysis results, this study proposes educational countermeasures to digital sex crimes, such as the need for early education to prevent digital sex crimes and the diversification of crime-reporting methods via the establishment of an educational portal site.

Keywords: digital sex crime; digital sex education; information and communication technology; information ethics; teenage crime.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adolescent
  • Adult
  • Communication
  • Crime
  • Crime Victims*
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Republic of Korea
  • Sex Offenses*

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the 2022 Research Fund of Seoul National University of Education.