Unauthorized Charges of 299,000 Won: ChatGPT 'Ghost Payments' on the Rise

[Anchor]

Recently, there has been a surge in reports of high-priced subscription fees for the AI service ChatGPT being charged without the users' knowledge. So far, at least 800 cases of such unauthorized transactions have been identified.

Reporter Lee Tae-kwon has the story.

[Reporter]

On June 3, an office worker surnamed Lee received a text message notifying them that 299,000 won had been charged to their debit card.

The charge was for a one-month subscription to the most expensive ChatGPT Pro plan, a service the user had never signed up for.

[Lee (surnamed)/Victim of unauthorized charge: I had never even entered my card number, but suddenly a payment went through... It was honestly very frightening. I'm worried that this might happen with my other cards as well.]

Since the beginning of this month, 1,368 payments for ChatGPT Pro plans have been processed in Korea, totaling approximately 400 million won.

Of these, 858 cases, amounting to about 250 million won, have been identified as suspected fraudulent transactions.

The payments were processed through nine major credit card companies, including Lotte, NH Nonghyup, and KB Kookmin.

Payments can be made by entering a card number, expiration date, date of birth, and the first two digits of the card's PIN. It is presumed that someone obtained this information to carry out the transactions.

[Hwang Seok-jin/Professor at Dongguk University's Graduate School of Information Security: They might be checking whether the card numbers are valid, or they could be bundling the payment information and selling it as a package to generate profit.]

OpenAI, the operator of ChatGPT, stated, "It has been confirmed that ChatGPT did not initiate payments without user consent, but rather that stolen card information was used without authorization," adding that they have "deactivated the affected payment methods."

NICE Information & Telecommunications, OpenAI's domestic payment gateway provider, also explained that they have canceled about 700 of the suspected fraudulent transactions and are currently reviewing the remaining cases.

The company also announced that it has temporarily suspended additional payments and new card registrations, and plans to introduce an additional mobile phone identity verification process.

The Financial Supervisory Service stated that it has requested credit card companies to strengthen their detection of abnormal transactions.

(Video reporting: Lee Moo-jin, Kim Han-gyeol | Video editing: Choi Jin-hwa | Graphics: Jegal Chan)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.