In South Korea, missing-person reports were filed every five minutes — Korea Herald

During the Chuseok holiday periods in 2023–2025, police in South Korea received 5,155 missing-person reports — an average of approximately one every five minutes. Korea Herald reports, citing data from the National Police Agency obtained by Yang Bu-nam, a lawmaker from the Democratic Party of Korea.

Most reports concerned adults

Adults, including people reported missing after leaving home, accounted for 2,994 cases, or 58.1% of all reports. Another 983 reports, or 19.1%, concerned children under the age of 18.

Police also received 805 reports of missing people with dementia — 15.6% of the total. Another 373 cases, or 7.2%, concerned people with intellectual disabilities, developmental disabilities, or mental disorders.

More current news is available on the UA.News Telegram channel Telegram.

Review of closed cases

During the six-day Chuseok holiday in 2023, police received 1,603 reports; in 2024, they received 1,461 over five holiday days; and in 2025, they received 2,091 over a seven-day period. By the end of each of these holiday periods, law enforcement had closed a total of 4,748 cases, or 92.1% of all reports.

The number of closed cases later rose to 5,152, leaving only three reports in the active missing-person records system. The data were released amid attention to whether police properly verify the whereabouts and safety of missing adults before closing cases.

Following an incident on Jeju Island in which a police officer closed the missing-person case of a woman aged 30–39 and deleted her data from the system without confirming her safety, police are reviewing around 310,000 missing-person cases closed over the past three years. The review is expected to be completed in November.