Coupang sees drop in daily users after massive data breach

SEOUL, December 5 (AJP) - Coupang, South Korea's leading e-commerce giant, has been seeing a drop in daily users after a massive data breach was detected late last month.

According to an analysis by market researcher IGAWorks on Thursday, Coupang's daily active users fell to 17.80 million last Tuesday, down from a record 17.98 million the previous day. This marks the first decline after three consecutive days of increase since last Saturday, despite the breach.

With daily users still above 17 million, many customers appear to continue using the platform, either overlooking the risk of a data leak for convenience or finding it difficult to switch to alternative platforms for daily necessities.

But industry observers believe many users will gradually leave the platform, attributing last week's initial surge in logins to those rushing to change their passwords or close their accounts following the breach.

Meanwhile, many users have been complaining about difficulties terminating their accounts, which involves a lengthy process including verification of personal information. The Korea Communications Commission (KCC) is investigating whether the process may infringe on users' rights to discontinue services.

The breach was initially believed to affect around 4,500 users but was later revealed to impact more than 33.70 million.

* This article, published by Aju Business Daily, was translated by AI and edited by AJP.