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A member of the South Korean parliament has put forwards an initiative aimed at criminalising account boosting in video games.
Representative Lee Dong-sub has tabled the initiative, which could see account boosting punished with a hefty fine of up to 20 million Won ($18,000), or some time in jail.
A member of the Korean parliament put forth an initiative that would make video game account boosting a criminal offense punishable with jail time and a hefty fine. This has been reported bySports Seoul’sKim Jin-Wook, (translated by Slingshot Esports) who has also written that the law, as it’s currently proposed, would outlaw anything ‘that enables other players to get higher points or better results in ways that are neither offered nor approved by the game developers for profit.”
“There are three major factors that eat away at the esports industry,” said Representative Dong-sub. “Those are illegal hacking programs, unsanctioned private servers, and boosters for profit. The first two will be properly regulated beginning at the end of this month with the bills I proposed, and now it is time to deal with boosters.”
Boosting refers to a player being carried by another player on your team or giving someone else access to your account for the purpose of levelling your account far outside your own capabilities. Sometimes this is done for profit, and those businesses would be outlawed if this new law were to pass.
At the moment, boosting is big business in the country. With game developers getting increasingly tough on the practice and with this law, it could become very risky indeed.
