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"Though the Internet is high speed, for various reasons, almost entirely legal (that would involve thousands of words to properly explain and would probably req

"Though the Internet is high speed, for various reasons, almost entirely legal (that would involve thousands of words to properly explain and would probably require a dive into South Korean Social Security law believe it or not),..." I hope you'll take the time one day to write that up. Sounds fascinating.

bane 16y ago
It's all rather confusing and complex (and reads a bit like an episode of connections), but the gist is this: To gain access to a website and get an account, you need to supply your social security number as a convenient unique identifier. This is all so that if you do something bad, like commit fraud, or distribute child porn or whatever, the authorities can figure out who did it (I know, I know, there's an entire debate about why using your SSN like this is a bad idea). In the States, the government goes through all kinds of gyrations to ensure separation of interests to protect personal privacy. The same level of privacy protection simply doesn't exist in South Korea. To my understanding, this SSN gathering requirement is required by law. Further complicating matters, encrypted communications (via web browser) are mandated by law to use an ancient ancient activeX control (like 1998 ancient) implementing an encryption standard called SEED. Why this is is one of those funny historic happenstances. In the late 90's South Korea's internet buildout was booming and the necessity for encrypted communications (for things like online purchasing) was seen as imminently necessary. If I recall, the U.S. was not allowing export of 128-bit encryption technology, and the exportable 40-bit SSL was considered not secure enough. So the South Korean government, in the interest of promoting online business, brought KISA (their NSA) in to develop a homegrown 128-bit encryption system. SEED was then implemented as an ActiveX control for IE6 and a plugin Netscape and the use of this system was enshrined in law. As you can imagine, the wheels of government turn incredibly slowly, even in Korea, so lawmakers have never really updated this law. Once Netscape went away, all that was left was IE and thus the stubborn persistence of IE6 to this day. As you can guess this has left most Koreans with huge security vulnerabilities on their machines, and outdated browser (who's inadequacies they try to fix with Flash) and myriad other problems. Fortunately, this may all end soon as there's growing momentum for the government to take another look at the law and bring South Korea's internet users into the 21st century. TL;DR version: If you want to use an online service in South Korea, you have to make an account, and to make an account you need to use your SSN, and since you don't want to transmit all that in the clear, you want to encrypt that number, and since you want to encrypt it you have to use SEED, and since SEED only exists as an ActiveX control, you are stuck with IE6. Some more reading on it http://seoulspace.co.kr/2010/03/09/ie6-no-more-not-in-korea/ http://seoulspace.co.kr/2010/03/09/ie6-no-more-not-in-korea/ (the comments are great) http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2009/09/123_52401.html http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2009/09/123_52401.h... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEED http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEED http://www.anythingbutipod.com/forum/showthread.php?t=60225 http://www.anythingbutipod.com/forum/showthread.php?t=60225 (sorry if I got some details wrong, this is just what I happen to recall, but should nail down the important points)

bane 16y ago

It's all rather confusing and complex (and reads a bit like an episode of connections), but the gist is this: To gain access to a website and get an account, you need to supply your social security number as a convenient unique identifier. This is all so that if you do something bad, like commit fraud, or distribute child porn or whatever, the authorities can figure out who did it (I know, I know, there's an entire debate about why using your SSN like this is a bad idea). In the States, the government goes through all kinds of gyrations to ensure separation of interests to protect personal privacy. The same level of privacy protection simply doesn't exist in South Korea. To my understanding, this SSN gathering requirement is required by law. Further complicating matters, encrypted communications (via web browser) are mandated by law to use an ancient ancient activeX control (like 1998 ancient) implementing an encryption standard called SEED. Why this is is one of those funny historic happenstances. In the late 90's South Korea's internet buildout was booming and the necessity for encrypted communications (for things like online purchasing) was seen as imminently necessary. If I recall, the U.S. was not allowing export of 128-bit encryption technology, and the exportable 40-bit SSL was considered not secure enough. So the South Korean government, in the interest of promoting online business, brought KISA (their NSA) in to develop a homegrown 128-bit encryption system. SEED was then implemented as an ActiveX control for IE6 and a plugin Netscape and the use of this system was enshrined in law. As you can imagine, the wheels of government turn incredibly slowly, even in Korea, so lawmakers have never really updated this law. Once Netscape went away, all that was left was IE and thus the stubborn persistence of IE6 to this day. As you can guess this has left most Koreans with huge security vulnerabilities on their machines, and outdated browser (who's inadequacies they try to fix with Flash) and myriad other problems. Fortunately, this may all end soon as there's growing momentum for the government to take another look at the law and bring South Korea's internet users into the 21st century. TL;DR version: If you want to use an online service in South Korea, you have to make an account, and to make an account you need to use your SSN, and since you don't want to transmit all that in the clear, you want to encrypt that number, and since you want to encrypt it you have to use SEED, and since SEED only exists as an ActiveX control, you are stuck with IE6. Some more reading on it http://seoulspace.co.kr/2010/03/09/ie6-no-more-not-in-korea/ http://seoulspace.co.kr/2010/03/09/ie6-no-more-not-in-korea/ (the comments are great) http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2009/09/123_52401.html http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2009/09/123_52401.h... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEED http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEED http://www.anythingbutipod.com/forum/showthread.php?t=60225 http://www.anythingbutipod.com/forum/showthread.php?t=60225 (sorry if I got some details wrong, this is just what I happen to recall, but should nail down the important points)