Korea Telecom (KT), South Korea's second largest wireless operator, recently posted a notice on its website stating that its 115 domestic telegraph service will end on December 15. Korea Telecom said: "Due to changes in the communications market environment, (telegram) communication volume has been declining sharply every year. Due to increasing losses, the company will no longer provide this service."
Previously, Korea Telecom had stopped international telegraph services on April 8, 2018.
KT did not disclose the number of customers using Telegram. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the telegraph was the best and fastest way to spread news over long distances.
Telegraph service was introduced in South Korea in 1885, and the first telegram was sent between what was then Seoul and the western port of Incheon.
However, with the popularity of email and mobile phones in the 1990s, the number of telegram users in South Korea has been declining sharply.
Not just South Korea. The world is also experiencing a trend toward the end of telegraph services. The United Kingdom abandoned telegraph in 1982, the United States sent its last telegram in 2006, and Germany terminated telegraph service on January 1, 2023.