(MENAFN) South Korean authorities have apprehended more than 3,000 people over the past year for offenses tied to online sexual misconduct, with officials noting that almost half of those implicated were teenagers.

From November 2024 through October 2025, the National Police Agency (NPA) recorded 3,411 incidents involving digital sexual exploitation, which resulted in the custody of 3,557 individuals. Among them, 221 were officially charged and arrested.

When examining the categories of wrongdoing, infractions related to deepfake content accounted for 35.2% of all cases.

These were followed by materials involving minors at 34.3%, and unauthorized or illicit recordings at 19.4%, according to a news agency.

A significant portion of the individuals under suspicion—1,761 of them—were teenagers.

Additionally, 1,228 were in their twenties, while 468 and 169 were in their thirties and forties, respectively.

The NPA noted that more than 90% of those apprehended for deepfake-related violations were teens or young adults, likely because of their heightened acquaintance with digital technologies.

Compared with the previous year, arrests linked to online sexual crimes rose by 47.8%, the NPA reported.

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