Do we like Hwang Ui-jo?
Our score: 1 out of 10. A criminal conviction for illegally filming a woman without consent, plus a Korean football ban, with only on-field achievements to set against it.
Hwang Ui-jo came up through the K League and made his name abroad. A 2018 Asian Games wildcard pick that fans grumbled about, he ended up top scorer with nine goals, won gold and took KFA Player of the Year. He then ran through clubs in Japan, France, England and Turkey.
The trouble started in November 2023, when he was summoned by police as a suspect over secretly filmed sexual encounters. His lawyers said the other woman knew about the filming. The victim's lawyer said she clearly did not consent and accused his side of causing her secondary harm. The KFA suspended him from the national team while police investigated.
In February 2025 a Seoul court convicted him of illegally filming a woman without her consent on four occasions in 2022 and gave him a one-year prison term, suspended for two years. Prosecutors had sought four years. The court noted that he accepted wrongdoing, that he said he was sorry, and that someone else spread the footage online. He was cleared on the charge involving a second woman.
On appeal in September 2025 the Seoul Central District Court upheld the sentence, saying the victims experienced extreme mental distress. Reports say the victims refused his settlement offer. He apologised publicly and said he would focus on football to win back fans' trust. Neither side appealed further, so the conviction stands.
The harm check here is narrower than for most people on this page. Nothing on LGBTQ+ rights, climate or politics turned up in the reporting we read. But harm to women counts, and a conviction for filming a woman without consent is his own act, not a company he kept. That is why he fails.
The fallout has been real. The KFA said in September 2025 that he is under a “quasi-permanent expulsion” from football in Korea. It cannot act on his Turkish career, though. Separately, a police officer was sentenced in December 2025 for leaking details of the investigation to a lawyer. The court tied the leak to a blackmail attempt on Hwang. That makes him a blackmail target too, but it doesn't change his own conviction.