Customer’s ‘Telecommunications Data Policy’
||2026.04.14
Due to the policies of the three mobile carriers, there are repeated cases of customers who cannot deliver or carry over the remaining data to their family members or acquaintances every month, raising complaints. The Democratic Party of Korea showed its willingness to improve during last year's presidential election, but it has not changed for more than 10 months since the birth of the new government. Critics point out that instead of unrealistic policies such as data security options (QoS), which are only up to 400 kbps, data sharing and transfer policies are needed to fundamentally resolve the lack of customer data.
According to related industries on the 14th, SK Telecom, KT, and LG U+ customers cannot properly share data provided every month.
SK Telecom operates ‘T-to-T-Data Gifts,’ which allows gifts up to 2GB per month. Family members can share up to 80GB if they subscribe to the additional service ‘T-Family Moa Data,’ but this is limited to LTE users. 5G pricing plan cannot be registered.
KT allows only subscribers of combined products to send up to 2GB per month to family members and acquaintances per customer through Family Box.
LG U+ can send up to 2GB of monthly data through ‘data exchange.’ Unlimited pricing plan customers can send only 4GB of data to two family members. Customers who subscribe to the ‘easy family combination’ while using the 5G signature pricing plan can send up to 60GB of data. However, the conditions for subscription are strict.
For data carryover, only KT is currently available. Among KT customers, those who use LTE Basic, Y Basic and 5G slim pricing plan can use them until next month if they have data left over this month. However, carryover benefits are not applied to unlimited data pricing plan. SK Telecom and LG U+ do not have data carryover systems.
The issue of data transfer and sharing has been raised mainly by the National Assembly. The National Assembly’s Science, Technology, Information, Broadcasting and Communication Committee asked the Ministry of Science and ICT to improve the data, saying, “Why is the data that consumers purchased carried over to prevent it from being used and extinguished?” Ryu Je-myung, the second vice minister of science and technology information and communication, replied, “We will consider increasing user benefits.”
In addition, the Democratic Party of Korea announced in May last year, just before the presidential election, that it would establish a user-centered data utilization system by granting the choice of remaining data gifts or carry-over to the central pledge book.
However, since the birth of the new government, the data-related policies have gone sub-surface. The data transfer and sharing plan were not included in the Lee Jae-myung administration’s five-year plan for state administration in August last year, the Ministry of Science and ICT’s work report in February this year, and the agenda for reforming the pricing plan of the three telecommunications companies in April.
Civic groups and experts point out that the Ministry of Science and ICT needs to operate the data system with more will. Kim Joo-ho, head of the People’s Economy Team of the People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy, said, “As data sharing and transfer are blocked due to the carrier’s policy, customers are using pricing plan that the whole family can't even use,” and pointed out, “As the data used per customer per month reaches 30GB, the government should come forward to solve the data sharing and transfer problem.”
Ahn Jung-sang, a professor at Chung-Ang University’s Graduate School of Communication who served as a senior expert on information, communication, and broadcasting media at the Democratic Party of Korea's policy committee, said, “The data that customers receive after paying monthly fees can be considered to be owned by customers, so customers have rights.”
“The effect of the government's full introduction of QoS is limited,” he said. “On the other hand, if we solve the data carryover and sharing problem, we can solve the problem of customer data shortage to a large extent.”
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