By Kim Tae-jong
Staff Reporter
TNS Media Korea, a private media research institute, Friday strongly denied allegations that it manipulated reports on viewer ratings. It said it would take legal action against broadcaster SBS, which reported the news on its main news program.
"The report by SBS was based on incorrect information provided by a former TNS employee who has a grudge against the company after being fired because of work delinquency", Min Gyeong-sook, chairwoman of TNS Media Korea, said Friday morning during a news conference at the Westin Chosun Hotel in downtown Seoul. "We're now planning to take every possible legal step against SBS".
A news report that aired on SBS at 8 p.m. on Thursday said the research firm manipulated some 600 pieces of viewer rating data produced from October 2003 to January 2005.
The news program said it obtained a secret report in the form of a Microsoft Excel file from a former TNS Media Korea employee. It said the file contains examples of data manipulation and the reasons for it.
Min said the file was not an official company document; rather, it was selective data gleaned by a disgruntled former worker. She said there could be some mistakes in the data between 2003 and 2004 because of system malfunctions that forced employees to type in data and they could have made mistakes. But those mistakes were not evidence of data manipulation, and the news coverage came from the lack of the broadcaster's understanding on the procedure how view rating data are collected, she said.
After the conference, the former employee sent a letter apologizing to Min, saying "I deeply regret that I made a file portraying the company as manipulating data, which never happened".
Local viewer rating research is conducted by two companies _ the AGB Nielsen Media Research, which was set up here in 1992, and TNS Media Korea, which was founded in 1999. Their reports on viewer ratings are considered the most important data for the television commercial market, which is estimated to be worth 3 trillion won.
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