Mobile carrier KT said Thursday that it has signed an agreement with the National Information Society Agency to join a development consulting project to build a state-run National Data Center in Brunei.Through the project, Brunei will be able to establish an information center to hold and process industrial data. The total consulting expenses for building the NDC in the Southeast Asian state amount to about 2.8 billion won ($2.6 million), the mobile carrier said. KT added that the consulting pro

Home shopping company Hyundai Hmall said on Tuesday that it was slapped with a tax penalty from the National Tax Service for underpayment of sales tax. The fine is worth about 54.2 billion won ($50.5 million), which accounts for about 6.5 percent of the company’s 832.4 billion won in capital. The state-run tax agency imposed the penalty on the company for not following its sales commission tax policy, having paid less tax than other major home shopping firms for the last five years.Hyundai Hmall

One day ahead of Wednesday’s presidential election, the nation’s three major mobile carriers stepped up intensive mobile traffic control on Tuesday to prevent possible data traffic surges and cyberterrorism. KT, SK Telecom and LG Uplus expect that mobile traffic may be overloaded on election day, as the use of mobile social networking services will likely soar as people use smartphones to check out real-time ballot counts and election results.Their election protection plans include expanding the

Mobile carrier KT rolled out “olleh biz talk,” a messenger program specialized for corporate use, on Monday. Combining characteristics of a traditional messenger program and smartphone text-messaging, olleh biz talk provides services including chat, message, fax, phone call, audio and photo message, and group message. Unlike traditional messenger programs, olleh biz talk is accessible both through computers and mobile phones. The contact lists are organized by the company’s structure.The messeng

The International Telecoms Union, the United Nations’ agency for information and communications technology, failed to draw consensus on bringing each country’s Internet regulations under the international community’s control. As Internet traffic has far surpassed telephone use, regulatory powers ― including taxation of cross-border cyber traffic, censorship and network neutrality ― have become key issues.The ITU hosted this year’s World Conference on International Telecommunications in Dubai bet

The number of smart device users in their 50s and 60s rapidly increased in 2012 from last year, data showed Thursday.According to research by the Korea Communications Commission and the Korea Internet Security Agency conducted between July 1 and Sept. 15 on some 73,000 participants, the number of owners of smart devices in their 50s increased nearly fivefold in just one year, from 9.5 percent in 2011 to 46.8 percent in 2012. Smart-device users in their 60s steeply increased over the same period

Korean mobile carrier KT is considering taking part in bidding for Moroccan mobile carrier Maroc Telecom, according to news reports on Tuesday. Reuters reported that KT may jump into bidding for the 53-percent stake in Maroc Telecom currently held by French conglomerate Vivendi. Citing two people familiar with the situation, the agency reported that the seller, Vivendi, hopes to make about $7.15 billion. But KT officials neither confirmed nor denied the news. “They (decision makers) said ‘no com

The launch of the iPhone5 on Dec. 7 has sparked a war between mobile carriers KT and SK Telecom, over hegemony in Korea’s Long Term Evolution market. Securing the largest client base is the first priority, the telecommunication firms said, to win a larger share of the smartphone market since the nation introduced LTE. Although reservations for the iPhone5 began before the official launch, not all applicants stuck to their original orders, a KT official said. The first-week iPhone sales will prov