The Financial Supervisory Service said that in the year since Lee Chan-jin took office as governor, the supervisory system centered on protecting financial consumers and the response system to financial crimes affecting people's livelihoods have been enhanced, shifting the paradigm of financial supervision from ex-post relief to preemptive prevention.
The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) on the 14th announced "major achievements since Lee Chan-jin took office as governor," citing as key results: ▲ building a consumer-first supervisory framework ▲ strengthening the response system to financial crimes affecting people's livelihoods ▲ cracking down on acts that disrupt market order ▲ building a fair and transparent capital market ▲ creating a financial environment friendly to financial consumers. Lee took office on Aug. 14 last year, marking the first anniversary on this day.
The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) said it has used the Governor's direct Financial Consumer Protection Advisory Committee to examine major supervision, inspections, and regulatory improvements from the consumer's perspective, and has established a system to detect potential consumer risks in advance through the Consumer Risk Response Council. It added that it is also pushing to build a supervisory framework that strengthens the responsibilities of manufacturers, distributors, and supervisory authorities so consumers can be protected from the product manufacturing stage.
It said it is also working to respond to financial crimes affecting people's livelihoods. Through on-site rapid inspection teams, it detected new and variant crimes such as mobile phone rentals, and conducted a coordinated inspection of predatory financial practices such as illegal debt collection. It enhanced the financial sector's abnormal transaction detection system (FDS) to detect new types of phishing and mule accounts, and built "ASAP," a platform to share suspected crime information to block damage in advance. It said it is also pushing to introduce special judicial police for livelihood-related areas.
It said it responded with a zero-tolerance policy to acts that disrupt market order, such as insurance fraud. It detected schemes including offering obesity treatments, kickbacks at long-term care hospitals, and insurance fraud involving falsification and manipulation of medical records using artificial intelligence (AI), and shared related suspicions with relevant agencies such as the Ministry of Health and Welfare. It also imposed sanctions for illegal acts that caused consumer harm, such as the misselling of equity-linked securities (ELS) and the mass leakage of credit information.
It said it also strengthened the response to unfair transactions in the capital market. It referred a reporter who engaged in front-running before article distribution and others to prosecutors, and reported a senior executive at a securities firm to prosecutors for using nonpublic information. It also uncovered the spread of fake news by finfluencers, and in April introduced intelligence-led investigative authority to the capital market special judicial police.
The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) said, "The past year was a time to shift the paradigm of financial supervision from ex-post relief to preemptive prevention and to lay the groundwork for breaking unreasonable practices." It added, "For the remainder of the term, we will listen to the market's voice to ensure that the protection of financial consumers and investors takes firm root and that the financial industry can grow to the next level."