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Noh Jong-myun, secretary of the Democratic Party’s Special Committee on Media Reform, speaks during a press briefing at the National Assembly in Seoul on September 8. / Source: Song Ui-joo

The Democratic Party’s Special Committee on Media Reform has tentatively agreed on a “separate regulation” plan that would apply the Press Arbitration Act to media outlets and the Information and Communications Network Act to YouTubers.

Noh Jong-myun, secretary of the committee, told reporters at the National Assembly on September 7 that the panel reached a provisional conclusion to regulate YouTube separately from traditional media. “The idea is to specify YouTube channels as a subject under the Network Act and establish a legal framework that allows a certain level of regulation when problems arise,” Noh said. He added that this was not yet a final decision and could change depending on the course of discussions.

Noh also stressed the need to replace the term “punitive damages” with a perspective of “normalizing compensation for damages.” He argued that current remedies for victims of false or fabricated reporting are inadequate. “Compensation of just a few million won is insufficient compared to the actual harm. Media reform starts from the recognition that damage relief is very weak in cases of false or manipulated reports,” he said.

He further explained that ordinary reporting errors without intent or gross negligence should be defined as “false reporting,” while cases where reporters knowingly spread falsehoods or failed to verify information that they reasonably should have known are classified as “false or manipulated reporting.”

The committee also plans to include measures to prevent “strategic lawsuits against public participation” (SLAPPs), often filed by powerful figures or large corporations against media outlets. “We are studying reasonable countermeasures against SLAPPs as requested by the media sector,” Noh said. “We will work to include a ‘preliminary judgment system’ in the bill so that courts can first assess the nature of a lawsuit before proceeding to the merits.”