VANK
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VANK or Voluntary Agency Network of Korea is a non-governmental South Korean organization made up of 16,000 volunteers, including 1,000 youth members and 5,000 foreign members.¹ It was started in 1998 by Park Ki-tae and a group of 300 young people concerned about the "distorted" image non-Koreans had of Korea.² In particular, VANK criticises major online websites, including the CIA World Factbook, for posting "mistakes or inappropriate expressions" about Korea, including use of the name Liancourt Rocks instead of the preferred Korean name "Dokdo".³ VANK is insisted on that the owning right insistence Liancourt Rocks of Japan is a threat to the global peace. Then VANK started the Discount Japan Campaign that induced to make the Japanese position in the international society decrease from 2005. ⁴

In 2005, their successful efforts to convince Google Earth to use the name "East Sea" instead of Sea of Japan in their online maps led to widespread news coverage in Japan, including a profile in the Asahi Shimbun. In response, some 2channel users tried Dos attack into VANK's website and destroyed several documents. ⁵

In 2006, VANK insisted that the invention of print is not Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg but Jikji of South Korea. And, they sent mail to publishers of textbook and encyclopedia all over the world.⁶

In 2008, Korean DC Inside and other Internet users attempted Dos attack to 2channel becouse Mao Asada in Japan won a come-from-behind victory against Kim Yu-Na in figure skating GP final. 2chneel user insisted that the attack origins are VANK and DC. And they tried retaliation Dos attacked DC Inside and VANK. VANK insist that VANK does not participate in attack. It is not clear whether VANK did Dos attack to 2channel.⁷⁸

VANK is supported by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology of South Korea, and the ministry announced it will continue to support a group of self-appointed “cyber diplomats” who seek to correct what they see as misrepresentations of Korea.⁹ VANK had received help of the activity capital from the South Korea government.¹⁰¹¹

Criticism

VANK's efforts to pressure various organizations to use Korean rather than Japanese names for individuals and geographic locations, though sometimes successful, have not necessarily earned them recognition of the correctness of their positions. For instance, an About.com spokesman, relating his company's decision to use the name "East Sea" to refer to the body of water, stated that they chose to use the name "not necessarily because it agreed with the South Korean geography activists but because the e-mail bombardment was so annoying."¹²

References

See also

• Korean nationalism

External links

• Official webpage