kakaotalk

In the first half of 2025, approximately 148K accounts were subject to service restrictions in General Chat. This is a 2.4% decrease from the previous period.

The breakdown of service restriction reasons is as follows:
- Scams & Impersonation: 66.8% (largest category)
- Illegal Spam (e.g., gambling): 17.5%
- Investment Advisory and Related Activities (formerly known as Quasi-Investment Advisory): 8.7%
- Obscene & Sexual Activity: 5.0%
- Illegal Products & Services (new category): 2.0%.

The number of accounts restricted due to Fraud and Impersonation decreased by 4.8% from the previous period. In the first half of 2025, however, job scams related to writing fake reviews for shopping websites steadily increased. Job scams that involve watching videos were on an upward trend from May, and event-type scams related to hotel experience programs also showed an increasing trend as the vacation season approached. As the number of new job and event-type scams using monetary rewards as bait continues to grow, Kakao has strengthened its detection and blocking system based on related keywords and behavior patterns.

Meanwhile, accounts restricted for Illegal Spam (e.g., gambling) decreased by 32.3% compared to the previous period. There was an overall decrease in simple promotional spam messages, but between January and April, event-type scams promoting gambling websites temporarily increased.

Measures related to Investment Advisory and Related Activities (formerly known as Quasi-Investment Advisory) decreased by 33.1% compared to the previous period. This decline is linked to the drop in activity, as a strengthened policy to respond to illegal stock-tipping chatrooms has been enforced since the second half of 2024.

Illegal Products & Services is a category newly added with the amendment of the Kakao Operation Policy in June 2025, and it includes illegal debt collection practices, illegal loans or fund circulation, and transactions of illegal products. In response to the increasing number of cases related to illegal private loans and debt collection practices in the contactless digital environment, a related operation policy has been newly established, and restrictions have been reinforced. By the end of June, since the policy being enforced on June 16, 2,892 accounts have been restricted due to illegal loans and debt collection practices.

In the first half of 2025, there was an overall decrease in scams and types of scam in General Chat. At this point, the reinforced response to illegal finance and debt collection practices had been reflected through the establishment of relevant policies. Kakao strives to prevent users from harm and to create a safe conversational environment by advancing its response system, which is based on proactive detection and reporting of messages consisting of fraud and identity theft as well as illegal financial practices.