Starship Entertainment has released a new statement providing an update on legal action for malicious comments and defamation.

The statement shares the current status of legal action taken in July and also reveals that additional complaints were submitted on behalf of MONSTA X on December 3.

The statement reads as follows:

Hello. This is Starship Entertainment.

We express deep gratitude to the fans who send lots of interest and love to the artists of Starship Entertainment including MONSTA X, WJSN, Soyou, Kim Dasom, Jang Won Young, and An Yu Jin.

Early this year, we appointed law firms Sejong and Ius&Lex [to handle] comments on the internet and social media that are excessively malicious and distort [the truth], and we filed legal complaints on some of these malicious commenters to the Seoul Gangnam Police Station on July 4.

Some of them have received penalties through fines, while some other individuals were forwarded to the prosecution and are still under investigation. We plan on going beyond criminal action and are currently preparing to also take civil action.

In addition, we recently announced plans to take legal action regarding the spread of false information, malicious comments, sexual harassment, and defamatory posts about MONSTA X. Afterwards, through active tips from fans and our own monitoring, we collected defamatory posts including those with false information, sexual harassment, and insults that were spreading online and on social media, and we submitted additional legal complaints to the Seoul Gangnam Police Station on December 3.

As severe the harm was to our agency’s artists from the troublesome acts of malicious commenters, we plan on responding through strong action without leniency. Furthermore, we are continuously monitoring malicious and defamatory posts, and we will put in our full effort for the protection of our artists’ rights by continuing strong legal action through regular monitoring of malicious posts and the reckless spread of false information that are considered defamation according to the Act on Promotion of Information and Communications Network Utilization and Information Protection, etc. and insult according to the Criminal Act.

We earnestly ask for fans to continuously send tips regarding the spread of false information and defamatory posts including malicious comments about our artists.

We once again express deep gratitude to the many people who show support for [Starship Entertainment] and our artists.