Exclusive: Delivery Workers Share Apartment Access Codes in Group Chat

[Anchor]

Have you ever wondered how a delivery arrived at your door without the lobby intercom ever ringing? It has been confirmed that access codes for apartment and office building lobbies in Seoul's Gangnam area were being shared in a KakaoTalk group chat with over 200 delivery workers. The Personal Information Protection Commission has launched an investigation into the matter.

Reporter Kim Gyu-ri has the story.

[Reporter]

This is a notice posted on June 13 in a KakaoTalk group chat consisting of about 200 Coupang Eats delivery workers.

Following the names of apartment complexes, the building numbers, unit numbers, and four-digit codes were listed. These were the common entrance passwords for over 50 apartment complexes and office buildings in Seoul's Gangnam and Seocho districts.

I will try entering one of the passwords shared in the chat room myself.

The door opened.

This allows even outsiders to easily access the residential floors.

The person who posted the notice was a "team leader" who manages the delivery workers. A delivery worker, identified as A, expressed concerns about privacy and security issues and requested that the list be deleted.

[Delivery Worker A: I conservatively counted over 50 security codes for office building commercial areas alone.]

However, it was not the password list that was deleted from the chat room, but worker A.

[Delivery Worker A: An hour after I raised the issue, I was forcibly removed from the work chat room.]

The team leader who posted the notice explained in a phone call with SBS, "I posted it for the sake of work efficiency for delivery workers, for whom time is directly linked to income, but I deleted it immediately after the objection was raised."

He further explained that he had simply shared a list he received from another group chat room where delivery workers from various platforms gather.

While there have been cases where individual delivery workers have noted down lobby passwords on the edges of keypads, this is the first time it has been revealed that such a compiled list was shared via social media.

[Lee Seong-yong / Yeonsu-gu, Incheon: I think the very act of sharing passwords can be unsettling. You never know how it might be misused.]

[Seong So-hyun / Songpa-gu, Seoul: Women living alone might feel scared thinking that someone could freely come and go right up to their front door.]

The Personal Information Protection Commission has received the report from worker A and has begun verifying the facts.

[Hwang Seok-jin / Professor at Dongguk University's International Graduate School of Information Security: Documenting and sharing these codes goes beyond a simple matter of convenience and is highly likely to be a violation of the Personal Information Protection Act.]

Coupang Eats stated, "This is not a list compiled by Coupang Eats, and delivery-related information is provided only on a limited basis for up to 20 minutes after the delivery is completed."

Reported by Kim Gyu-ri | Video by Kim Young-hwan | Video Editing by Ahn Yeo-jin | Graphics by Jo Su-in and Kim Ye-ji
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.