According to this JoongAng article, foreigners can now register to get the infamous residence registration number which most Korean portals require for one to use their site. This might have helped for getting an exclusively Korean Cyworld account years ago, when it was cool.
Update:
As per another JoongAng article, NK defectors are now demanding new residence registration numbers because the current ones mark them as being defectors. As per the article:
. . . With these registration numbers, defectors can t travel to China because the Chinese government requires a copy of the family registries of visiting North Koreans. If their status becomes known in reviewing their papers, the Chinese government usually rejects their visa application.
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In my mind, it seems the article is implying that foreigners can *already* access those websites if they have a 외국인등록번호…this is just for those who wish to / can only provide a passport number.
It’s hard to tell with the atrocious grammar/syntax, though
With the changed numbers 6 years ago, weren’t we supposedly already allowed to do these things (as long as we had a foreigne registration number)? I was never able to register for anything…
Even with the changed numbers, creating accounts at some of the main portals required faxing a copy of your passport and/or Alien Registration Card. Have had to do that several times. The databases that some places used didn’t like the foreigner’s reg numbers.
There’s a similar piece at the KT I think. Some things seem to have changed… after reading the piece, I went over to daum, and I signed up for a hanmail account WITHOUT needing to input my reg number, though I didn’t need to have a cellphone number. Anyway, I seem to remember this was impossible a few years ago. Maybe I’ll try my luck at auction.co.kr soon (that one wasn’t possible before either).
“…sign up on local Web sites if they give the service ways to confirm the real names of foreign online users”
does this mean the websites themselves have to write the code that can access whatever the Ministry is doing?
in other words, if sites don’t want to deal with the hassle of making their sites foreigner-friendly, then they won’t bother to “give the service ways to confirm”…
I hope it goes well; gmarket was the site i really wanted to get into, but they now have a foreigner sign-up in English (don’t worry, u can still use that account to buy the products cheaper in the korean gmarket pages!)
Well, that doesn’t solve the problem that websites shouldn’t be allowed to ask for the number. After all, one’s registration number is confidential information.
Heh, it’s like they can fully cater to foreign resident buyers in the first place. Online buyers still have to jump through hoops and all to buy even the simplest of stuff. Haven’t they learned anything from Amazon yet?
In the 2.5 years that I’ve been living i Korea, I was finally able to setup my first account on a major Korean site this very week : Naver !
I am now the proud user of a Naver e-mail, blog, photo album, and more account. I was floored that:
1. It accepted my foreign registration number without a hiccup
2. It accepted all 22 characters of my name (spaces included) as it appears on my foreigner registration card
3. It didn’t ask for anything else out of reach for registered foreigners
4. To verify, it simply sent a registration code to my cell phone rather. In other words, it did not require any special handling or extra steps simply because I was a foreigner.
5. Everything worked in Firefox with no f’ing ActiveX. Woot !
The website registration form was all in 한굴, but hey, that’s the official language, so that was more than fine with me.
한글
I can’t even spell the name of the language correctly, but yet I can register on Naver.com…if that shows you how easy it is (…or how ignorant I am).
A similar issue I think is why people outside of Korea can’t access Korean sites. Why the big barrier?
And, doesn’t the KORUS FTA clearly agree to equal electronic access under the Services section? Wouldn’t the registration number requirement breach the FTA quite obviously?
As only one example I registered on Naver but I can’t post or even access the Cafe once I log in with my limited waegook-in pseudo membership, which actually seems to shut me out more than let me in…
Yeah, a hub…
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