South Korea's antitrust regulator claimed that it would impose a total of 33.6 billion won (US$25.06 million) in fines on three domestic mobile carriers for exaggerating their 5G network speeds.
According to the Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC), the three South Korean telecom firms — SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus — had exaggerated their 5G network speeds and unfairly advertised that they were the fastest relative to their competitors.
"The three telco companies advertised that consumers could use target 5G network speeds, which cannot be achieved in real-life environment ... Companies advertised that their 5G network speed was faster than competitors without evidence," the KFTC said in a statement.
The KFTC confirmed that the size of the penalty for each company would be different. The KFTC hopes this measure will serve as an opportunity for the three companies to move away from competition using unfair advertisements.
SK Telecom and KT Corp. declined to comment. Meanwhile, a spokesperson for LG Uplus said the company is reviewing the sanctions.
As of June 2023, there were a total of 30.76 million 5G network users in South Korea, accounting for about 38% of the total 80.23 million mobile subscriptions in the entire country, according to data from the Ministry of Science and ICT.
