HYBE, one of the leading entertainment companies in South Korea, has responded directly to controversies surrounding leaked internal documents. The documents, which caused a significant uproar in the K-pop industry, were initially criticized by Min Hee Jin, the former CEO of ADOR, in an internal email.

Min Hee Jin’s Reaction to the Documents

In April, Min Hee Jin voiced her concerns about the document’s content:

“The content is so biased that I suspect that it was distributed for some type of propaganda. We need facts such as numbers and want at least a minimum level of objectivity.”

Official Apology by HYBE CEO

HYBE CEO Lee Jae Sang issued an apology regarding the documents and acknowledged their inappropriateness:

“The document contents were very inappropriate. We have immediately halted the writing of the document and we will create guidelines and strengthen internal control to prevent this from happening again.”

Despite this apology, HYBE denied allegations of reverse viral marketing, often referred to as media play, as a motive behind the document.

Statement from Weverse Magazine

Further clarity was provided when Weverse Magazine identified the former editor-in-chief as the individual responsible for compiling the document. The team stated that other members were not involved.

HYBE’s Q&A with Media

In a Q&A session with CBS NoCutNews, HYBE addressed several pressing questions:

Q: The Weverse Magazine team stated its official position on November 9. Why did they release a separate statement ten days after the CEO’s apology?
A: As you have heard, Lee Jae Sang made an apology on October 29 and removed the Weverse director who wrote the report from their position. Since then, there have been numerous suspicions that other members of the Weverse Magazine team were a part of writing the documents. Due to this, we decided to release an additional document to clarify.

Q: The Weverse Magazine team stated that, aside from the former editor-in-chief, no other members or external contributors knew about this document. Does this mean that the former editor-in-chief asked a separate staff that’s not part of the team, to write the report? Also, there is a part of the document that states, “The members who are participating in the report are taking off so the report will take a break for one week,” which is being criticized as not being persuasive. What’s your position on this?
A: The former editor-in-chief created the monitoring document as a separate task from Weverse Magazine, and the personnel that the former editor requested are separate members from the Weverse Magazine team.

Q: The former editor-in-chief has been removed from their position. What is their current position? Are there any other follow-up measures in relation to this incident?
A: The former editor-in-chief is currently on standby and not working. After an internal review, appropriate measures will be taken.

Q: In the CEO’s apology, he denied the suspicion of reverse viral marketing. However, a netizen claiming to be a HYBE employee stated that many of the things in the report were actually planned. Do you still stand by the claim that there was no reverse viral marketing, and if they are false, are you preparing follow-up measures about this?
A: The claim that we used reverse viral marketing is not true. We are considering taking the appropriate measures regarding the false claims.

Q: You said you are contacting each agency separately to apologize directly. Please explain how and to what extent you are apologizing.
A: We apologized to each agency of the artists mentioned in the documents by phone or through official documents under the name of CEO Lee Jae Sang.

Follow-Up Measures

HYBE emphasized their commitment to transparency and outlined steps to prevent similar incidents in the future, including creating new internal guidelines and stricter control measures.

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Source: nocutnews