People Power Party lawmaker Choi Soo-jin delivers a filibuster on the partial amendment to the Act on Promotion of Information and Communications Network Utilization and Information Protection, etc., during the plenary session of the extraordinary National Assembly held on the 23rd. [Yonhap News] 

On the 5th, the People Power Party voiced strong opposition to the amended Information and Communications Network Act, which was pushed through by the Democratic Party of Korea and is set to take effect on the 7th, stating that "it will inevitably lead to structural 'excessive deletion' and 'pre-censorship'."

In a commentary that day, Chief Deputy Floor Spokesperson Choi Soo-jin stated, "With the law's implementation approaching, so-called 'online survival manuals' are being shared, leading to a phenomenon where citizens are voluntarily refraining from expressing themselves or self-regulating their tone."

She emphasized, "The fact that citizens have already begun self-censorship before the law even takes effect is a clear example of how this legislation stifles free expression. While we must strictly respond to false information and malicious cyberbullying, freedom of expression and the freedom to criticize power—guaranteed by the Constitution—must be protected at all costs."

She added, "To avoid the burden of massive damages and heavy fines, platforms will have no choice but to preemptively delete or block posts for which the illegality is not clearly determined. Ultimately, corporate risk-aversion will take precedence over judicial judgment, and even legitimate criticism and debate will disappear along with it."

Chief Deputy Floor Spokesperson Choi stated, "A society where citizens choose silence for fear of punishment is not what a liberal democracy looks like," adding, "We will thoroughly monitor cases of infringement on freedom of expression and excessive deletion that arise after the law's implementation, and we will take the lead in legislation that protects the fundamental rights of the people by correcting toxic provisions, such as ambiguous definitions of false and manipulated information and excessive platform liability."

Previously, Representative Joo Jin-woo criticized the amended Information and Communications Network Act as a 'law to gag the people' and announced plans to file a constitutional complaint to challenge the constitutionality of SNS censorship.

People Power Party lawmaker Yoon Sang-hyun [Yonhap News file photo]

Five-term lawmaker Yoon Sang-hyun quoted President Lee Jae-myung’s past remarks that "sovereign citizens are allowed to criticize the President" in a Facebook post, sarcastically asking, "Now that you occupy a position of power, are you that afraid and terrified of the criticism and scrutiny directed at you?"

He further pointed out, "They say the entities tasked with determining whether information is false are private fact-checking organizations supported by the Transparency Center under the Korea Communications Commission—an organization neither elected by the people nor accountable to them. The idea of arbitrarily defining what is true and what is false through a government-controlled body—if this isn't totalitarianism, what is?"