The South Korean government began a review of imposing taxes on the so-called Over the Top(OTT) content service provided on the Web.

According to industry sources on Thursday, the ICT Ministry recently requested the state-run Korea Legislation Research Institute to study overseas cases of digital taxation, including one for YouTube, and the feasibility of introducing a similar system in the country.

Seoul is reportedly considering revising the cost-sharing of the country's broadcasting and communications development fund, to include OTT service providers, like YouTube and Netflix, amid the expansion of the online broadcasting market.

The development fund is raised from government contributions, public collection stated under law, and expense sharing among broadcasters, system operators and satellite service providers to better promote the broadcasting and communications industries.

YouTube operator Google has been criticized for paying too little in taxes in South Korea, despite making trillions of won in sales each year.

According to the office of the ruling Democratic Party(DP) Rep. You Seung-hee, Google only paid 20 billion won in taxes to the South Korean government in 2017, reporting sales totaling only 260 billion won.