News
Legal action is being taken against South Korea’s leading operators SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus after around 1,000 5G smartphone users committed to take legal action over poor quality of the service on the 5G network.
Yonhap, a local news agency, reports customers are seeking at least KRW1 million ($885) in compensation per subscriber from the three mobile operators with law firm Joowon, driving the legal action. The users claim of slower than advertised data rates and poor coverage, limited to major cities despite the service costing more than LTE plans.
Last June, Korea’s Ministry of Science ICT and Future Planning said it was aware of complaints and contract cancellations and as a result it started to test the quality of 5G services in major cities.
In January almost 1 million people signed up for 5G in South Korea taking the total to 12.87 million subscribers, of which 3.4 million are currently with SK Telecom who are targeting 9 million 5G million 5G users by the end of the year.
SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus are currently working on technology upgrades to provide standalone 5G networks as current services depend on previous 4G LTE networks. Collectively they are planning an investment of KRW 25.7 trillion by 2022 to boost 5G infrastructure across the country.
In 2020 KT won the World Communication Award 5G Business Award for an entry entitled The Amazing 5G. Entries are now open for the 2021 Awards.
