The late Kim Sae Ron is once again at the center of a disturbing controversy, even after her passing.
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According to the June 14 broadcast of MBC’s investigative program Straight, multiple allegedly manipulated audio recordings using the late actress Kim Sae Ron’s voice have been discovered. The recordings reportedly contained conflicting claims about her past relationship with actor Kim Soo Hyun and were allegedly used in attempts to demand money.
The episode focused on the recent actions of Kim Se Ui, the YouTube creator behind the channel Garo Sero Institute. The said YouTuber was recently arrested on charges including defaming Kim Soo Hyun by spreading false claims that the actor had dated Kim Sae Ron when she was a minor.
Arrest Warrant Issued For Kim Se Ui For Using AI To Fabricate Kim Sae Ron’s Voice
During the broadcast, Straight examined an audio recording that Kim Se Ui had released on May 7. The recording allegedly featured Kim Sae Ron saying she had dated Kim Soo Hyun while she was underage and he was an adult. However, police have reportedly concluded that the audio had been manipulated using AI.
According to Straight, the informant who provided the recording to Garo Sero Institute had approached Kim Soo Hyun’s agency about a month earlier with a completely different version of events.
The production team revealed, “The informant approached Kim Soo Hyun’s agency, saying they could provide a recording supporting the claim that Kim Sae Ron and Kim Soo Hyun dated after she became an adult, and demanded money in return.”
In an alleged message sent to Kim Soo Hyun’s side on April 5, the informant reportedly said, “There’s no need for us players to see each other face-to-face.”
I just give you the materials, I get the money, and that’s the end of it. I also have one more condition. I sell a certain product. Later, if Kim Soo Hyun does well overseas, let’s have him film a company ad for me for free.
— Informant
The report claims that while the informant sent Garo Sero Institute a recording alleging that Kim Sae Ron had dated Kim Soo Hyun as a minor, they provided Kim Soo Hyun’s side with another recording in which Kim Sae Ron allegedly denied dating him while underage. In other words, the late actress’s voice was allegedly used to create recordings containing completely different claims.
The informant is also said to have approached at least one entertainment YouTuber with audio files. According to the report, there are at least four known versions of the recordings.
Kim Soo Hyun’s legal representative, attorney Go Sang Rok, told Straight, “There are multiple versions of recordings with different contents that are being claimed to be Kim Sae Ron’s actual voice.”
The existence of those different versions itself is circumstantial evidence showing that they cannot be authentic.
— Go Sang Rok
The reported timing of the alleged recording also raised questions. The informant claimed to have met and recorded Kim Sae Ron in January 2025, about one month before her death on February 16. This was also before the controversy over whether she had dated Kim Soo Hyun as a minor had publicly emerged.
Police reportedly determined that the credibility of the recording was low, in part because it was considered suspicious that the informant would have been asking detailed questions about whether the two had dated when she was a minor before the issue had even become public.
Despite this, Kim Se Ui repeatedly claimed that the recording’s authenticity had been verified. He also made the outrageous claim that Kim Soo Hyun’s side had offered the informant tens of billions of won for the audio file, and later sent unidentified assailants to kill the informant after the offer was rejected.
Straight pushed back on that claim as well, stating that although Kim Se Ui claimed the audio had been verified by the National Forensic Service, the request for examination had actually been made by the police. The National Forensic Service reportedly concluded that verification was impossible because the file was not an original recording.
The report has sparked further shock and anger, as it suggests that Kim Sae Ron’s voice and name may have continued to be exploited even after her death.
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