Many South Koreans Have More than 4 Cellulars

Having two mobile phones is nothing out of the ordinary, but what about 4? A recent government report cited by The Korea Times showed that almost 50,000 people in South Korea have at least 4 mobile phones that they currently use.

That's one phone for business, one for the family, one for the girlfriend, the fourth for the other girl and the list goes on, according to how many handsets he owns. Moreover, 0.1 percent of the population has about 650,000 handsets, which means that there is an average of about 14 mobile phones for each person. That's a lot of girls to handle and a lot of phones to carry around.

There are also reports of more than 60,000 cases of false mobile phone registration that have been reported to the police over the past year. Some of the devices are thought to be used in crimes, although this is not a proven fact. "The mobile service companies should enhance their security policies to protect customers from possible damage", said Grand National Party lawmaker Kim Tae-hwan.

In South Korea, most mobile phones are contract-based, which means that they must be registered to the subscriber's personal account. Prepaid phones are mostly used by foreigners, which gives precision to this evaluation, as it mostly concerns locals.

The high number of mobile phone purchases that South Koreans make drove SK Telecom to charge a money deposit per unit after a person goes over 10 phones. The operator also separates foreigners into three classes: superior, normal and short-term visitors. According to this, they set the amount of mobile phone units that they are allowed to purchase. Diplomats, employees of major companies and U.S. military personnel are eligible for "superior" class, which enables them to own two contract-based phones and two prepaid phones.