Over the past three years, only 3.8 percent of the roughly 5,000 reported cases of ticket scalping for performances resulted in any action, such as ticket cancellation. Although penalties were strengthened following revisions to the Performance Act last year, scalped tickets for K-pop concerts, normally priced at 150,000 to 200,000 won, still sell online for as much as 9.7 million won, showing the practice remains rampant.

According to data submitted to Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) lawmaker Min Hyeong-bae of the National Assembly’s Culture, Sports, and Tourism Committee by the Korea Creative Content Agency (KOCCA) on September 29, a total of 5,405 scalping reports were filed between 2023 and August 2025.

Of these, only 306 cases (5.7 percent) included enough information to identify the tickets involved. Measures such as requesting explanations from ticket holders or canceling tickets were taken in just 207 cases (3.8 percent).

Concerts and other music performances accounted for the majority, making up 63.5 percent (3,433 cases) of the reported scalping incidents over the three years. Other categories, which include events not traditionally classified as performances such as fan meetings, accounted for 16 percent (868 cases), followed by game-related events at 4.6 percent (253 cases) and musicals at 4.6 percent (251 cases).

Scalped tickets were primarily traded on second-hand platforms such as TicketBay, which accounted for 78.7 percent (4,255 cases) of reported transactions. Social media platforms, including X, Facebook, Instagram, and Telegram, accounted for 19.8 percent (1,071 cases), while community platforms such as online cafes and blogs made up 1.5 percent (79 cases).

K-pop concert tickets occupied all 20 spots on the list of highest-priced scalped tickets monitored in KOCCA’s “Domestic Ticket Scalping Monitoring” project conducted from June to August. Concerts by K-pop artists including NCT WISH, aespa, NCT Doyoung, BLACKPINK, Boy Next Door, RISE, Zerobaseone, and DAY6 were resold at 18 to 51 times the original ticket price.

The highest-priced scalped ticket was for NCT WISH’s first solo concert since debut, “INTO THE WISH: OUR WISH,” scheduled for November 2. On one resale platform, a ticket originally priced at 198,000 won was listed for 9.7 million won. Following this were tickets for aespa’s third solo concert, “2025 aespa LIVE TOUR SYNK aeXIS LINE,” and NCT Doyoung’s concert “2025 Doyoung Concert DOORS” in June 2025, which were listed for around 154,000 won each but sold for 8 million won online.

Tickets for BLACKPINK’s “DEADLINE” concert in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province, this July, originally priced at 275,000 won, were resold on overseas platforms for 3.04 to 4.74 million won.

Under current performance law, penalties are limited to cases where macro programs are used habitually or commercially to illegally sell tickets. The Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism is pushing for more effective legislative revisions, including banning resale at inflated prices regardless of macro use.

Resource and budget shortages are also a problem. Over the past three years, only one staff member per year was assigned to the “Online Ticket Scalping Reporting Center,” operated by KOCCA’s Fair Coexistence Center under the ministry’s commission. The center’s annual budget has also been cut, from around 300 million won last year to about 200 million won this year.

Lawmaker Min said, “We urgently need to improve the system and expand staff and budgets to eradicate ticket scalping.”