South Korea Announces New Classification Standards for The Blockchain Industry and Legitimizes It

It seems like the battle for legitimacy that the blockchain and cryptocurrency industry is facing in South Korea seems to be near its end. The South Korean government has recently drafted new major industry classification standards for its domestic blockchain industry, according to the local media.

Three Korean ministries, the Ministry of Science and Technology, The Ministry of Information and Communication and the National Statistical Office have been working to produce a final draft that will be available by the end of July and will be a major step for the industry in the country, which is one of the most important markets for the blockchain technology at the moment.

According to the reports, this new decision and the classification standards will serve as a basis for any policy making on this new industry, specially regarding the promotion and the regulatory frameworks of the industry.

The idea of the South Korean government is to cover the construction of decentralized applications, cryptocurrency exchanges, transactions and blockchain systems in the country. This new draft defined exchanges as asset exchange and brokerage platforms, which is an important redefinition because it finally recognizes them as regulated financial institutions.

It may be said that the most important development is that the government is, for the first time, considering this industry to be real and will start to regulate it. Over 160 institutions will be consulted to create policies.

The government has decided to subdivide the industry classification scheme into three different sectors each one with ten further subdivisions that will be decided by the Korean Standard Industrial Classification.

This new policy will affect how blockchain integrates with other existing industries such as the financial sector, security, insurance, copyright management, supply chain management, software development and medical services, for instance.

It is still very early to be completely sure how this will affect the industry in South Korea but it can certainly be considered great news for the industry, as there will be less gray areas in the development of this sector.

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