Fruit of Love, which leaked the personal information of high-value donors including entertainers. Kyunghyang Shinmun AI image

At the Community Chest of Korea’s Fruit of Love, an incident occurred in which the real names and resident registration numbers of high-value donors, including entertainers and other prominent figures, were exposed.

According to Yonhap on the 5th, Fruit of Love, in the process of posting ‘2024 settlement data’ on its official website last April, uploaded a file containing personal information such as high-value donors’ names and resident registration numbers in its original form without separate processing.

Fruit of Love failed to recognize this for nearly a year and only belatedly deleted the file on the 4th. With sensitive personal information such as names and resident registration numbers having been exposed online for an extended period, concerns are mounting over secondary harms such as identity theft and voice phishing.

The list included 600 people, including prominent figures in politics and business who donated at least $15,000 (20,000,000 KRW), as well as well-known entertainers.

According to reports, Fruit of Love said, “We will send a notice and apology to those whose information was leaked and will provide telephone guidance regarding the fact of the leak.”

Following Fruit of Love, Hope Bridge National Disaster Relief Association, a legally designated disaster relief organization, also posted ‘2022~2024 settlement data’ on its website on the 5th of last month without masking donors’ real names, resident registration numbers, and donation amounts, and as the fact of the personal information leakage became known, unease has continued. The scale of the personal information leaked this time is said to reach around 1,000 people.