Kakao Privacy

Transparency Report refers to a statistical report outlining the government's requests for personal information and corporate responses thereby. The name signifies that the company transparently discloses to users how it responds to government's requests. Kakao will continue to exert its utmost efforts to protect users' rights and disclose the results in the transparency report.

Upon any request from a judicial authority, Kakao shall properly respond to such requests in due process based on the necessity for warrants, and disclose related matters in the transparency report. We believe that we are, as a member of our society, under the obligation to faithfully fulfill legal requirements, and that it is our responsibility to build trust with users by transparently disclosing related matters so that anyone can look up. Kakao is committed to fulfilling its duty of mutual trust between the company and users by updating the transparency reports twice a year. Kakao Transparency Report shows our firm determination to protect users' rights and our confidence that we stringently comply with due process to secure users' information. Kakao will continue to respond to the government's requests in accordance with legal regulations and share the status with our users in a transparent manner.

There is no fixed framework to prepare a transparency report and it may differ among companies. Mostly, a transparency report shares the status of the government's requests and the company's response. Kakao Transparency Report contains status data on government requests for personal information and Kakao's response thereby. We believe that our bi-annual disclosure will be the cornerstone of counterbalancing public security and individual privacy in our society.

Kakao does not directly respond to such requests from a foreign government, judicial authority, or private institution. They must, if necessary, request cooperation from the Korean government and judicial authority. Also, Kakao does not deal with a request from private institutions that have not fulfilled procedural formality.

Kakao Transparency Report uses three types of statistical figures: the number of government requests, the number of cases processed, and the number of provisions. The number of requests and the number of cases processed are based on the number of documents submitted by investigative agencies. The number of requests means the number of documents requested by the government, whilst the number of cases processed refers to the number of documents provided upon the government's request. The number of provisions refers to the amount of data processed in association with specific IDs and phone numbers.

Kakao responds to a request from judicial authority only if the documents meet all legal requirements. If documents submitted by the government fail to meet the legal requirements, we do not provide any personal data. That is when statistical difference may occur - the number of cases processed is less than the number of requests.

In principle, Kakao does not provide any personal information without consent from the user. However, if a case falls under exceptions stipulated in relevant laws, a part of personal information may be subject to the provision. Explicitly, the Personal Information Protection Act sets it as an exception if otherwise specified by other laws.

Service providers shall not disclose or divulge the fact that an investigation agency has requested to provide information pursuant to the confidentiality obligations of the Protection of Communications Secrets Act. According to the Protection of Communications Secrets Act, when a public prosecutor or a judicial police officer has executed confiscation, search, investigation or communication-restricting measures or has been provided with communication confirmation data, regarding telecommunications of which the transmission and reception had been completed, he/she shall be obliged to notify the object of such fact. Any prosecutor or judicial police officer thereby shall, when he/she institutes a prosecution or takes a disposition not to institute any prosecution or indict (excluding any decision made to suspend any indictment), notify in writing the person subject to such disposition of the fact that the warrant is executed, the institution that executes such measures and the period thereof within 30 days. Therefore, any information offered to an investigation agency can be confirmed by a competent prosecutor or judicial police officer.