A 44-year-old South Korean man in Singapore has been sentenced to three months in jail after secretly recording his former girlfriend during intimate video calls without her consent.
The man met the 45-year-old woman on Tinder in 2022, and they began a relationship. While they were in different countries, the couple maintained contact through video calls, including intimate calls.
The woman had repeatedly made it clear that she did not want to be recorded and even asked him to confirm that he was not making recordings. He told her that he did not know how to record his screen.
Despite that, he secretly recorded 17 videos of her between February and October 2023. The recordings lasted between about seven and 56 minutes and were stored on a hard drive at his home in Singapore.
The couple ended their relationship in January 2024. The man later began dating another woman, who discovered the hard drive while helping him clean his home.
She confronted him and demanded that the recordings be deleted. He subsequently destroyed the hard drive because he feared it could be used as evidence.
But the recordings had already been copied.
The new girlfriend later contacted the victim through social media and told her about the recordings. The victim subsequently made a police report, while copies of the videos were also handed to investigators.
The court heard that the victim was deeply distressed after discovering what had happened. A gag order was imposed to prevent information that could identify her from being published.
The man pleaded guilty to one of three charges, including an offence involving recording a person without consent and offences under the Films Act. Prosecutors argued that he had knowingly continued recording the woman despite her repeated objections and had abused the trust placed in him.
His defence sought leniency, saying he had wanted to maintain an emotional connection with his former girlfriend and had compensated her. Prosecutors sought three-and-a-half months’ imprisonment.
The court ultimately sentenced him to three months in jail.
The case highlights the legal consequences of secretly recording intimate material without consent, even when the people involved had previously been in a relationship and the recordings took place during private video calls.
