Creator's dream or legal nightmare? AI revolution changes the game in Korea's webtoon industry

An image created by generative AI program Deep AI with the prompt, "Robot painters and human painters competing" [DEEP AI]

 
Korea led a revolution in the comics genre when in the early 2000s, authors switched from pen and paper to tablets and mobile screens, beginning the webtoon scene in an infinite online space. Two decades later, webtoons stand at the forefront of the battle between human creativity and AI technology, in a space that may signal the biggest transformation in not just comics — but art as a whole.
 
A genre born for the internet, bred by smartphone culture and sharpened by the rising popularity of video streaming platforms with audiences always yearning for a well-made story, webtoons provide a fertile environment for AI services to thrive.
 

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From simple illustrations to story writing and content piracy detection, a wider range of services have been popping up since the late 2010s from tech companies both big and small, as opposed to other culture sectors where the development or use of generative AI has been slow or experimental at best.
 
But it’s not entirely easy for the webtoon industry either. While there are tech companies developing newer, better AI services designed to assist human creators and webtoonists secretly using the tool to refine their work, conservative creators and consumers stand against the idea of allowing nonhumans to invade the artistic field.
 
As the country’s first AI law takes effect next year and social attitudes remain strongly against the idea of robot creation, society may be seeing the dawn of a longer, larger battle between humans and their new, intelligent competitor.
 

An image created by generative AI program Deep AI with the prompt, "A cartoon strip of panels showing robot painters and human painters competing" [DEEP AI]

An image created by generative AI program Deep AI with the prompt, "Cartoon strips of robot painters and human painters competing" [DEEP AI]

AI in webtoons
 
The usage of AI tools in webtoons became a major trend during the Covid-19 pandemic when online content creation and consumption saw exponential growth due to social distancing guidelines that kept people bored at home.
 
Startups specializing in AI-assisted illustrations started opening up for business in 2019, namely Lion Rocket and Toonsquare, which were soon followed by Korea’s largest webtoon platform Naver Webtoon’s first official AI service — the AI Painter in October 2021. Other major startups that came after also focused on helping with illustrations, such as Realdraw, Onoma AI and Cream.
 
Each service differs in some way, such as how much the webtoonist actually has to draw and how much is left up to the AI — or whether the program is offered to individual artists or caters to webtoon businesses. For example, creators can train a tailor-made program to draw up a webtoon episode after learning a certain webtoonist’s style, as in the case of Realdraw, or webtoonists can draw their work but have AI add the finishing touches, which is the specialty of Naver Webtoon’s AI Painter.
 
Outside of the creative field, Naver Webtoon and Kakao Entertainment both use AI to curate webtoon series to each user’s taste and to detect illegal content piracy taking place online. Naver Webtoon has been using its intellectual property (IP) protection system, Toon Radar, since 2017, and Kakao Entertainment caught 240 cases of pirated content during the latter half of 2024 through its P.CoK piracy combat team.
 

Naver Webtoon's Challenge Comics section, or a section for amateur webtoonists, flooded with comics with the title "AI Webtoon Boycott" with an image of an AI ban sign in June 2023 [SCREEN CAPTURE]

A not so warm reception
 
But while these services promised to, and may very well, make creation easier and more efficient for creators, the reception wasn’t quite so warm from the market.
 
In fact, Naver Webtoon suffered a monthlong boycott from amateur webtoonists and readers in May 2023 when a new series on Naver’s Webtoon platform titled “Knight King Returned with God” (translated) showed scenes that were accused of using AI-generated images due to their awkwardness.
 
In one scene, some objects were placed differently compared to the adjacent scenes, and in others, a maid was standing on a bed instead of next to it, and so on, leading readers to believe that the artist had used an AI program without much care.
 

A scene from Naver Webtoon series "The Knight King who returned with the God" (translated, 2023-), suspected of using AI [SCREEN CAPTURE]

 
Reviews for the “Knight King” webtoon fell to as low as 1.94 out of 10 once the news broke out, and commenters demanded that Naver Webtoon issue an apology as well as official guidelines over the extent to which webtoon creators can use AI tools. A boycott movement also spread on Naver Webtoon after the incident, with users uploading images stating their intent to boycott AI on the Webtoon Challenge section.
 
Protests over the influence of AI — like the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike held in the United States by screenwriters and actors or the silent album “Is This What We Want?” made this year by 1,000 artists opposing tech companies using their music to train AI programs — have yet to take hold with Korean creators and consumers. However, the public's resentment only stays latent because no company has yet to claim the general use of AI for their own profit.
 
Neither Naver Webtoon nor the “Knight King” creators made an official statement regarding the issue, but the platform remains — at least on the surface — AI-clean for now, while webtoonists also have refrained from speaking out.
 

Webtoons are promoted at the New York Comic Con 2024 held in the New York City on Oct. 18, 2024. [YONHAP]

Reading the room
 
Korean companies have been reluctant to take a public stand on the controversial issue, possibly in fear of displeasing consumers, but webtoon companies may very well have to, starting next year.
 
Korea passed the AI Basic Act on Dec. 26, becoming the second national state after the EU to establish a comprehensive AI law. One clause that has the webtoon industry paying attention is Article 31, which states that content providers must notify consumers if their product has been generated by AI.
 
Article 31 of the Act on the Development of Artificial Intelligence and Establishment of Trust, the official name of the act, states that a generative AI operator or any other service provider that uses generative AI must notify users that its product or service has been created by AI. Failure to do so could result in a fine of up to 30 million won ($20,600).
 

Visitors look around the 2023 Webtoon Job Festa exhibits held at Coex, southern Seoul, on Nov. 28. [YONHAP]

 
The law will be established later this year but will not go into effect until Jan. 22, 2026. The government is finalizing the act and is expected to complete it in March at the earliest, according to the Ministry of Science and ICT.
 
The completed legislation will dictate just how much AI usage consititutes an AI-created work — does it have to be made entirely by an AI program or would the use of simple AI filters be enough? Or, if I ask ChatGPT to check my grammar or come up with a title for an essay, would this constitute stepping over the line? The law will also determine how the standards will be enforced.
 
Until then, both Naver Webtoon and Kakao Entertainment are keeping a low profile and will wait until such details are worked out. “Because this is the very early stage of a legislative process, we will act accordingly, when the government discloses the details of the decree and other guidelines,” a Naver Webtoon official said.
 

A visitor tries the webtoon illustration experience at the 2023 Webtoon Job Festa held at southern Seoul's Coex on Nov. 28, 2023. [NEWS1]

The inevitable adventure
 
However careful everyone remains, there is only one certainty amid the uncertainty: the day will inevitably come when AI infiltrates all human creativity. The path leading to that moment, however, remains unclear.
 
“Was there ever any technology that was welcomed with open arms at first?” said Seo Bum-gang, chairman of the Korea Webtoon Industry Association (KWIA).
 
There are already so many tech companies that are developing tools to help webtoonists and web novelists, so it’s best to accept and adapt to the imminent future rather than passively wait for what will certainly come, according to Seo.
 
“When photography was first invented, artists lamented that the end of art had come,” he said. “Now, we have artists using photography as a tool for their creativity and for creating their own style. AI technology is the same with webtoons. We may be facing repercussions because we’re scared of what we don’t know, but some people will definitely start using it to create something new, and that will start a whole new trend.
 

An image created by generative AI program Deep AI with the prompt, "A cartoon strip of numerous panels, each showing robot painters and human painters competing" [DEEP AI]

 
But while KWIA, one of the largest organizations in the webtoon industry representing web content companies, has taken a progressive approach toward AI, a webtoonists’ guild argued that caution must still be taken nonetheless.
 
“It’s true that there have been more webtoon creators using AI tools in various ways, especially in repetitive work, such as coloring or background research,” said Kwon Hyuk-chu, chairman of the Korea Webtoonist Association.
 
“But at the same time, a vast majority of authors are concerned with copyright issues, and our priority as the association of weboonists is to demand transparency in AI learning and compensation for the creators. We would also like to emphasize the need for a clear and fair guideline. If human creativity and their unique minds can be protected, then we can see a hopeful future for the webtoon industry where humans and AI coexist.”

BY YOON SO-YEON [yoon.soyeon@joongang.co.kr]