UPDATE
Controversy over plagiarism in Hong Jin Young’s master’s thesis is only getting more heated by the day.
After Kookmin Ilbo first questioned Hong Jin Young’s master’s thesis yesterday, the media outlet released the interview with the professor who taught Hong Jin Young.
According to the Kookmin Ilbo’s exclusive report on November 6, professor A, who taught Hong Jin Young, stated that her master’s thesis is 99.9 percent “fake.” Saying that she is the one who gave Hong Jin Young her credits for all the courses she took in her undergraduate, master’s and doctoral programs at Chosun University.
“She said that she faithfully participated in the class, but I barely remember seeing her in my class. At least that’s how she was in my class. She was busy with her career as a trot singer, so how could she have come to school, which is in Gwangju, that often?” A said.
A then added that the fact that Hong Jin Young’s father is a professor in the university made it impossible to make this issue public. He even claimed that Hong Jin Young’s doctoral dissertation has even a bigger problem and said, “I thought Hong Jin Young’s papers should not be approved, but in the end, they both passed a review. Now that it’s finally out, I hope the facts will be revealed.”
However, Hong Jin Young’s label IMH Entertainment refuted the report on November 5, saying, “It’s not fair to use the method (Copy Killer) on a paper that was written back in 2009. Moreover, the paper is Hong Jin Young’s creation and she did not plagiarize another paper.”
Back in 2013, Hong Jin Young appeared on Radio Star and talked about the frustrations she has over the “plagiarism controversy.” She flatly denied all allegations, saying, “You all know the world we’re living in. Why would I lie about that?”
Original Article
Hong Jin Young has been embroiled in allegations of plagiarism.
On November 5, Kookmin Ilbo reported that Hong Jin Young’s master’s thesis, “Study on the Trends of Cultural Content Industry through the Korean Wave,” recorded a 74 percent plagiarism rate in plagiarism review site Copy Killer. They also explained the result, saying that out of 556 sentences, 124 sentences had more than 6 identical words and 365 sentences were suspected of plagiarism.
Although there is no clear outline in law regarding plagiarism, normally, it is considered plagiarism if the results go above 20%. Earlier, when Rep. Lee Chae Ik raised suspicions of plagiarism in Defense minister-nominee Gen. Suh Wook’s doctoral dissertation, the plagiarism rate was 32 percent. Copy Killer was used then, too.
The informant stated, “Hong Jin Young received her Ph.D. at the university where her father is working despite her busy schedules as a trot singer. I started out from a reasonable doubt and found relevant data.”
Hong submitted her master’s thesis in April 2009 and passed the screening in May of that year to obtain her master’s degree. The time when she debuted as a trot singer with her hit song “Love Battery” was June 2009. This means that she prepared for the thesis as her song at the same time.
In a related development, an official from Hong’s agency IMH Entertainment said, “We are in the process of arranging our official position.”
Meanwhile, Hong Jin Young entered the industry through the 2006 drama Yeon Gae Somun and soon became a JYP trainee. After leaving the company, Hong made her debut as a trot singer in 2009 and made a huge hit. Since then, she has been continuing her sweeping uptrend. Most recently, she dropped her new song, “Never Ever.”