The number of sex offenders registered online under the Justice Ministry’s disclosure system climbed to around 15,000 over the last eight months, a lawmaker said Tuesday.

Citing data from the National Police Agency, Rep. Cho Won-jin said the number of sex offenders whose identities were made public reached 15,095 in August this month, up 47.4 percent from December 2013.

By region, Gyeonggi disclosed the identities of 3,611 sex offenders online, followed by Seoul (3,208), Busan (969) and Incheon (918). In Jeju, the number of offenders doubled to 228.

In 2011, the Justice Ministry introduced the identity disclosure system, which publishes the personal information of sex offenders online to curb sex crimes and increase safety in local communities.

However, the number of sexual offenses continued to rise despite the disclosure policy.

Since the system took effect in 2011, the number of multiple offense sex offenders went up by 34.5 percent in 2013.

By Kim Da-sol, Intern reporter
(dasolkim@heraldcorp.com)