Korea Communications Commission to conduct first-ever on-site visit to TikTok Korea over cash reward concerns

The Korea Communications Commission plans to conduct an on-site visit to TikTok Korea — the first such inspection since the platform launched its cash reward events three years ago.

The move comes after concerns over the cash reward program and its potential role in driving social media addiction among minors were raised following earlier coverage published Wednesday. The EU had previously moved to rein in TikTok's cash reward events, citing youth addiction risks.

The Korea Communications Commission will visit TikTok Korea's offices later this month to examine the status of its cash reward events, according to reporting Monday.

It will be the first on-site visit since TikTok Lite launched in South Korea and began its cash reward program in December 2023. Through the visit, the commission plans to assess whether TikTok Korea is properly restricting minors from participating in the events.

While participation in the cash reward events is officially limited to adults aged 19 and older, concerns over youth addiction have persisted because multiple workarounds exist — including using a parent's account. The commission said it will focus specifically on whether minors can withdraw reward funds and what measures are in place to prevent misuse.

The decision to conduct a direct inspection marks a shift from the commission's previous approach of managing the cash reward program through documentation such as youth protection activity reports.

TikTok Korea has continued running the cash reward events despite ongoing controversy. The events have taken various forms — including promotions called "Bukchigi," "Popcorn Pangpang" and "Moonlit Night Market" — but all share the same basic structure: users recruit new members through personal invitations and receive up to 600,000 won ($424) in cash based on their level of participation.

The cash reward program has been a major driver of TikTok Lite's rapid user growth in South Korea, including among minors. TikTok Korea has not tried to conceal the program's effect, describing it as designed "to attract new users and encourage existing users to be more active within the app."

TikTok Lite's monthly active users stood at 163,355 in December 2023, when the first cash reward event launched, but surged to about 8.34 million by January this year. The figure has since held consistently at around 7.5 million as of last month.

The EU, by contrast, opened an investigation in April 2024 into whether TikTok's cash reward events and related practices violated the Digital Services Act, citing concerns over youth addiction. As the probe intensified, TikTok first suspended the cash reward events that same month, then shut them down entirely.

Margrethe Vestager, then executive vice president of the European Commission, said at the time that the EU had made TikTok's commitments under the DSA "legally binding" and that it would "carefully monitor TikTok's compliance."

The Korea Communications Commission, now belatedly moving to assess the situation firsthand, said the upcoming visit would be "the first on-site visit aimed at examining individual cases of youth SNS addiction." It added that through the visit it would "listen to explanations about how the service operates and what youth protection measures are in place, and request improvements where they fall short."