South Korea's ICT ministry said Sunday it plans to spend 129.8 billion won ($108.2 million) on ramping up data projects this year, including distributing "data vouchers" to support small and medium-sized businesses. The latest investment comes as part of efforts to utilize data collected from the so-called Data Dam project, an initiative that kicked off in 2020 to gather data generated through p...

South Korea's antitrust regulator said Sunday it has decided to impose a fine of a combined 19.5 million won ($16,300) on Google, Netflix and three other video streaming services for their unfair business activity over paid subscription. Five over-the-top (OTT) media service providers -- Google, Netflix, KT, LG Uplus and Content Wavve -- hampered paid subscribers' move to end their membership, a...

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety said Sunday self-test kits for 30 million people will be available at local pharmacies and convenience stores for two weeks starting this week. The ministry will also distribute self-test kits for 24 million people at COVID-19 testing clinics and virus-prone facilities starting Monday. In light of the surge in at-home treatment patients, the government earli...

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has attended the second groundbreaking ceremony for 10,000 homes in the capital, calling the project a "long-cherished desire" of the country, Pyongyang's state media reported Sunday. The official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said North Korea broke ground in the Hwasong area Saturday on the second part of the housing project and Kim delivered a speech at the ...

Minor presidential candidate Ahn Cheol-soo called off a planned press conference Sunday after his wife tested positive for COVID-19. Ahn of the centrist People's Party had called the press conference earlier in the day amid speculation he could make a proposal on how to merge candidacies with Yoon Suk-yeol of the main opposition People Power Party to field a single opposition candidate in the Ma...

Main opposition presidential candidate Yoon Suk-yeol pledges to create a standing dialogue channel between the two Koreas and the United States by establishing a liaison office either in the inter-Korean border village of Panmunjom or in Washington if elected president. The liaison office idea was one of Yoon's top 10 campaign pledges that the main opposition People Power Party candidate put tog...

The number of daily COVID-19 cases in South Korea reached a fresh high of 56,431 on Sunday, as the highly transmissible omicron variant continued to spread fast across the nation. The fresh cases, including 56,297 local infections, raised the country's total caseload to 1,350,630, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA). The latest figure marks the fourth day in a ro...

HONOLULU -- South Korean Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong met with his Japanese counterpart, Yoshimasa Hayashi, in Honolulu on Saturday to discuss a wide range of bilateral and regional issues, including North Korea and disputes over their shared history. The bilateral meeting was held before the foreign ministers were set to hold trilateral talks with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in the ...

BEIJING -- South Korea will renew its budding women's curling rivalry with Japan at Beijing 2022 on Monday. South Korea's Team Kim, led by skip Kim Eun-jung, will play two games at the National Aquatics Centre on Monday. It will first face the United States' Team Peterson starting at 9:05 a.m. (local time), or 10:05 a.m. in Seoul. Then the nightcap starting 11 hours later will pit Team Kim again...

Italian fashion brand Gucci is also preparing to open a fine dining restaurant at Gucci Gaok, the company’s second flagship store in Korea, also located in Hannam-dong. While Gucci Korea officials confirmed that Gucci Osteria da Massimo Bottura is slated to open in the first half of the year, they declined to disclose further details. In the meantime, fashion industry insiders note that the Gucc...

Embroidery and bojagi (traditional Korean wrapping cloths) are displayed in Exhibition Building 3, along with donors’ collections. The Education Building is home to children‘s museums on the second and third floors. Photos by Park Hyun-koo Written by Song Seung-hyun

“Homo sapiens were excellent problem solvers. We have found pieces of Obsidian, a dark volcanic glass formation rock, used to make weapons and tools and which are only available near Baekdu Mountain in the Korean Peninsula, in the Imjin-Hantan River area,” said Yoo. The Imjin-Hantan River area is several hundred kilometers away from Baekdu Mountain, the source of the Obsidian rocks. “It’s evidenc...

Korean men who grew up in the 1980s or 90s would likely remember the first time they were taken to the barber shop, a transformative moment of entering the realm of men instead of tagging along with their mothers to join other women at the hair salon. Hair salons are for women, and barber shops are for men. This was the mainstream view back then. But these places are no longer defined as such, a...

Jeong, an installation artist, has explored and questioned the relationship between the human body and robotics or artificial intelligence. Having studied drama and music, she is also a choreographer and combines body movements with performative machines in her exhibitions. Born in 1980, she is the recipient of the 16th Hermes Foundation Missulsang in 2016. The world’s biggest art exhibition wil...

When I was in my early 20s studying at a college in the US, I was invited to a dinner party at a Korean professor’s home. He was treating all students from Korea and students majoring in Korean at his home. His wife was an amazing cook – she was more popular among the students than her husband who was teaching Korean at the university. She showed me how she made her japchae, the ever famous Kore...