Kim Kwang Soo (60), production manager and producer of MBK Entertainment, who was accused of manipulating online voting by mobilizing 10,000 credentials during Mnet’s “Produce 101 Season 1”, was sentenced to a fine at the first trial.
Seoul Central District Court today fined producer Kim Kwang Soo 10 million won (7,500 euros / $ 8,500) for obstructing business. Park (38), CEO of Pocketdol Studio, was also fined 10 million won. Pocketdol Studio was created by MBK Entertainment and Interpark.
The pair were accused of obstructing CJ ENM‘s work, giving 10,000 credentials borrowed from employees from March to April 2016 and ordering them to vote online for the three MBK trainees who participated in Produce 101.
At that point, CEO Park offered producer Kim to inflate the number of votes with borrowed name identifiers so that the three MBK Entertainment trainees would not be knocked out of the rankings, producer Kim agreed. Producer Kim was found to have ordered employees to vote intensively, especially for two interns. As a result, a total of 89,228 false online votes were cast out of a total of 9,945 out of 10,000 IDs, according to the survey.
“The defendants purchased a large number of other people’s identification in an abnormal manner to raise the ranking of candidates for their entertainment agencies, in the audition program and influenced their ranking by voting for a particular artist“, said the court.
The court said: “The influence of the fraudulent vote is limited to certain changes in the ranking of the cast members and didn’t affect the outcome of the final selection of members of the idol group. The defendants admit their actions. reprehensible and have not had a criminal record for five years.“
Journalist: Shawn
Translator: Shawn
Source: Mnet
