South Korea

South Korea criminalises both the sale and purchase of sex under a twin-statute regime enacted 22 March 2004: the Act on the Punishment of Acts of Arranging Sexual Traffic (Act No. 7196) and the Act on the Prevention of Sexual Traffic and Protection of Victims Thereof (Act No. 7212), collectively the "Anti-Prostitution Special Act". Sellers and buyers face up to 1 year imprisonment or a fine of up to 3 million KRW; intermediaries and brothel operators face up to 7 years and fines up to 100 million KRW, escalating to up to 15 years under Criminal Act Chapter 31. On 31 March 2016, the Constitutional Court (case 2013Hun-Ka2) upheld the criminalisation of voluntary sex work 6-3. Foreign nationals enter via the E-6-2 "entertainment" visa, in practice the primary funnel for migrant sex work; the UN CEDAW Committee (November 2023) found Korea violated the rights of three Filipina women trafficked through this regime by treating them as prostitution offenders rather than victims.

Traditional red-light clusters have been dismantled: Cheongnyangni-588 in Dongdaemun (200 brothels at its 1980s peak) was demolished between March 2017 and February 2018, with no relocation support. Seoul's Mia-ri Texas zone has been hollowed out by redevelopment. The trade has migrated into "room salons", "kissing rooms" and "delivery health" call-out services — Seoul alone reportedly hosts over 25,000 room salons and kiss rooms, with Itaewon and Gangnam accounting for ~40% of the capital's street prostitution. Itaewon's "Hooker Hill" weathers repeated raids but consistently produces near-zero arrests; recent enforcement has shifted to drug-and-sex crossover busts in Gangnam (October 2024 ecstasy/ketamine raid: 91 arrested at a single entertainment bar). E-6-2 visa holders report passport confiscation, debt bondage, and coerced commercial sex (Amnesty International, US 2025 TIP Report).

Korea's Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) is one of Asia's strictest data-privacy regimes on paper, but in practice the infrastructure that enabled the 2018–2020 Nth Room / "Doctor's Room" Telegram exploitation case (Cho Ju-bin, ≥103 victims including 26 minors, ~60,000 paying users) is routinely weaponised against sex workers. The post-2020 "Anti-Nth Room" laws (April 2020 / May 2021) criminalised possession, purchase and viewing of illegal sexual imagery (up to 3 years or 30M KRW), but private Telegram channels remain effectively untouchable — a gap re-exposed by the August 2024 deepfake-Telegram scandal (~220,000 users).

Sex work on a tourist (B-2 / K-ETA) visa is illegal, exposes workers to arrest, fine, deportation and re-entry bans. The E-6-2 "entertainment" visa is the only legal channel for non-citizens — and even it functions in practice as a trafficking funnel (the UN CEDAW 2023 ruling). The Philippines temporarily banned worker dispatch to Korea in February 2024 over abuse complaints. Workers entering via E-6-2 should never sign contracts in-country, never surrender their passport, and assume that bar/club work labelled "entertainment" will involve coerced commercial sex.

No legal advertising channel. Korean-language listings circulate on closed KakaoTalk groups, encrypted Telegram channels, and adult-portal sites that operate from offshore hosts and frequently get DNS-blocked. International platforms (Tryst, P411, Eros) are accessible but legally risky for both advertisers and clients.

• Hanteo (한터) — National Union of Sex Workers (founded 2004, decriminalisation-aligned)
• Giant Girls / GG (거인여성) — feminist + sex-worker coalition
• Durebang / My Sister's Place (두레방) — camp-town focus (abolitionist-leaning)
• Dashihamkke Center (다시함께센터) — government-affiliated exit programme