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Meet the South Koreans using spy gadgets to fight workplace bullying and toxic employers
- Abusive behaviour by people in power is known as ‘gabjil’ – and employees are using hidden surveillance devices to fight back
- Under new laws, company owners who ‘unfairly demote or dismiss’ workers who allege harassment can be imprisoned for three years
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South Korean workers fed up with bullying are being increasingly emboldened by a new tougher labour law to secretly record alleged abuse or harassment by their bosses, boosting sales of hi-tech audio and video devices.
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Gadgets disguised as leather belts, eyeglasses, pens and USB sticks are all proving popular with employees in a country where abusive behaviour by people in power is so pervasive that there is a word for it: gabjil.
Several incidents have made international headlines, most notoriously the 2014 Korean Air “nut rage” case in which the airline’s vice-president Heather Cho assaulted a crew member over the way she was served macadamia nuts in first class.
Jang Sung-Churl, chief executive of electronics firm Auto Jungbo, said covert recording devices “have been selling like hot cakes” since the government flagged changes to the labour laws late last year.
Under the new legislation, which came into force on July 16, company owners who “unfairly demote or dismiss” workers who allege harassment can be imprisoned for three years or fined up to 30 million won (US$24,700). An online chat room created by lawyers, called Gabjil 119, gives free advice on bullying cases.
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Auto Jungbo’s sales of voice recorders so far this year have doubled to 80 devices per day, Jang said as he forecast sales to also double this calendar year to 1.4 billion won.
This glasses frame is a camcorder ... The pen is the most popular though
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