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Can you be sued for defaming virtual K-pop stars? South Korea court says yes


They may be fictional characters, but they are voiced by real people, the court says.

A court in South Korea has ordered a social media user to pay 500,000 won ($360; £265) for defaming a K-pop boyband - whose members are virtual characters. Plave, which debuted in 2023, is one of K-pop's most successful virtual stars, with more than one million followers on its YouTube channel where they regularly post music videos and vlogs. Among them were comments that the people behind the avatars "could be ugly in real life" and gave off a "typical Korean man vibe", Korea Times reported.

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