Article Source: SBS Entertainment News
aespa Winter’s posts, turned out to be written by a person of the same name…”Legal Response”
It turns out that the posts that spread rapidly online that Winter (real name Kim Minjeong) of girl group aespa wrote while she was in school was not Winter but written by a person with the same name.
A woman who identifies with a name the same as Winter’s said, “I went to Yangsan JoongAng Middle School. Although I was also born in 2001, I didn’t even know Winter… I don’t know who stole my posts, but I will take legal action because they are spreading with my personal information and causing sexual harassment and defamation,” said.
The author of the posts also complained of unfairness upon revealing her graduation album and ID with her real name.
Recently, online allegations that Winter, who graduated from Yangsan Samsung Middle School, used abusive language and profanity in posts written during her school days, referring to the body of EXO members and caricatured them, rapidly spread online.
However, the controversy was settled when the author of the posts was revealed to be of the same name, not Winter.
[End of article]
On January 8, 2022, screenshots from an ask. fm account of someone named Kim Minjeong (born 2001) from Yangsan had spread through online communities. Rumors quickly spread that this account is Winter’s as Kim Minjeong is her real name and she is also from Yangsan. Not that the content of the screenshots warrant severe criticism as they mostly show the interests and attitude of a regular middle shooler, but antifans and passerbys alike have began throwing words of judgment and cursed Winter without verifying the identity of the account owner.
Later in the evening, as a desperate measure, Winter’s Korean fans found and revealed her real ask.fm account which only has less than a hundred responses. Apparently, someone who knew Winter at school gave this information and vouched that the leaked account isn’t hers because she has a different account and because her way of typing doesn’t match that of the leaked account.
Q: I’m in 7th grade in Samsung Middle School. I like you ㅋㅋㅋ Go out with me ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
A: ㅇ 0 ㅇ ?
Q: Why are you such a goddess??><
A: It would be nice if that was the case.. ㅎ
Q: Minjeong-ah, let’s keep in touch
A: I need to know who you are to contact you..><
———
An hour or so later, a person named Kim Minjung identified her self on Twitter as the owner of the leaked ask.fm account. Naturally, suspicions arose about the person’s identity. In response, Kim Minjung posted her Yangsan JoongAng Middle School yearbook and her National ID. It turned out that like Winter, her name is Kim Minjung and she is from Yangsan, Gyeongsangnam-do. She maintained that despite being born on the same year and also being from Yangsan, she didn’t know Winter personally. The account which spread online is hers. She expressed distress about her account being exposed and used for malicious reasons and having to upload verification materials to prove her identity. She said she was being harrassed and suffered abuse. She expressed her intention to sue the people who spread her account and caused her distress. (Source: 1, 2, 3)
DC Winter Gallery, Winter’s Korean fanbase, reached out to Kim Minjung to support them on the legal process (Source: 4)
Meanwhile, the stranger who posted the tweets implicating Winter has since changed their profile and made his/her account private.
It is important to note that throughout this ordeal and including those that came before, SM Entertainment has not responded to the demands of the fans to protect Winter. They have ignored our mass emails and ignored our requests to show some effort in preventing further malicious actions against their artist. This issue in particular was cleared up thanks to Kim Minjung’s intervention, the Korean fans who found Winter’s real ask.fm account, and DC Winter who volunteered their assistance on the legal process.
We hope to see people take responsibility for their actions and bear the consequences in this issue. We hope that this will set an example to those who still have the desire to take Winter down. We hope to send them a message. We will not tolerate such actions.
——————–
Winter’s real ask account was also revealed and now everything has been cleared up. However, the people involved in spreading these false claims are nowhere to be found and cannot take responsibility for their actions.
What happened was another case of antis defaming Winter online. We hereby urge Team Winter to cooperate with us in collecting evidences that might be useful in the case of taking legal action.
TeamWinterOffcl admins
