The Financial Supervisory Service said on the 16th that it will pay a total of 131 million won in rewards this year to 29 outstanding tipsters through the "illegal finance paparazzi" program it operates to encourage the public to report illegal private financing.
The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) said it selected reward recipients by focusing on tips about illegal financial activities that led to tangible investigative results, including the apprehension of suspects. The rewards covered specific tips on people's livelihood–harming financial crimes such as illegal high-interest loans and illegal debt collection, unregistered deposit-taking schemes luring with high returns, and investment fraud touting imminent listings of unlisted stocks.
The illegal finance paparazzi program was introduced in June 2016 to encourage reporting of illegal financial activities. Since the program began through the end of last year, the FSS has paid 749 million won in rewards over a total of 16 rounds.
Starting this year, the FSS expanded the reward scale to strengthen incentives to report. It raised the maximum per-person reward for reports on illegal private financing and illegal financial investments from 10 million won to 20 million won, and improved the program so that internal whistleblowers related to illegal financial activities receive double the existing reward, up to 40 million won.
A total of 29 people were selected for rewards this time: five in the excellent category will receive 50 million won, 11 in the active category will receive 55 million won, and 13 in the general category will receive 26 million won. By type, eight tips related to unregistered deposit-taking schemes accounted for 54 million won, 15 cases of illegal private financing such as unregistered lending businesses and illegal debt collection accounted for 45 million won, and six cases of illegal financial investment accounted for 32 million won.
This reward scale is the largest since the illegal finance paparazzi program was introduced. The total payout increased by 46 million won from 85 million won the previous year, for a growth rate of 54.1%. The average reward per case also rose to 4.5 million won, up 11.6% from 4 million won the previous year.
The FSS emphasized that active public reporting and tips are crucial to detecting and eradicating illegal financial activities carried out covertly. It urged people who have suffered damage from illegal private financing, illegal financial investments, or unregistered deposit-taking schemes, or who know related facts, to report through the Financial Supervisory Service Illegal Private Financing Damage Report Center.