Google Skirts Around South Korea Law With YouTube

PC World reports Google has disabled the ability for users to upload videos or comment on videos at YouTube Korea. Google made this move after South Korea passed a new law that requires sites with 100,000 unique visitors per day to require users to provide their real name and national ID card number before posting such videos and comments.

Google still allows videos to be uploaded and comments to be added while in Korea, as long as you change the YouTube Korea site to a non-Korean version, within the YouTube settings section. This is Google’s way of “skirting around” the new law. YouTube said:

We have a bias in favor of freedom of expression and are committed to openness. It’s very important that if users want to be anonymous that they have that chance.

There is additional commentary about this story at Techmeme.