Active-duty police officers who leaked criminal investigation information and personal data through internal police systems in exchange for kickbacks from private detectives — even creating an itemized price list to trade citizens' information — have been sent to trial.
The Criminal Division 1 of the Suwon District Prosecutors' Office said on the 15th that it had indicted a 47-year-old senior inspector surnamed A, assigned to the Hwaseong Dongtan Police Station in Gyeonggi Province, and a 41-year-old assistant inspector surnamed B, assigned to a police station under the Gyeonggi Bukbu Provincial Police Agency, on charges including accepting bribes after committing an unlawful act and disclosure of official secrets. Three private detectives who dealt with them — a 63-year-old surnamed C, a 41-year-old surnamed D, and a 45-year-old surnamed E — were also indicted on charges including bribery and violation of the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes (brokering).
The most striking element of the investigation was the circumstance in which an active-duty officer sold personal data accessible through the police computer network, having assigned prices to each category. Assistant Inspector B is accused of running a detective agency under a borrowed name, handing over information on a fraud suspect wanted by police to detective D, and receiving 700,000 won.
In particular, the investigation found that Assistant Inspector B created a "price list" for the types of personal data that could be queried through the internal police terminal and distributed it via Telegram. The price list included 150,000 won for a vehicle registration query and 800,000 won for a criminal investigation record query. He was found to have queried personal data without authorization and sold it upon requests from detective E and others, even haggling over prices through a messenger app.
Senior Inspector A is accused of illegally querying and handing over information on a wanted fugitive who was in hiding, after receiving a request from private detective C in June last year. Prosecutors say he queried, through the Korea Information System of Criminal Justice Services (KICS), information on individuals wanted on charges including operating gambling sites, then delivered it to C and received 1 million won. The information passed through the detectives and was ultimately delivered to the wanted individual himself, and in this process detective D was found to have received 15 million won from the wanted individual.
