Starship Entertainment Denies IDID's Kim Min-jae Linked to Far-Right Site Ilbe

Starship Entertainment has denied online claims that IDID member Kim Min-jae is a user of the Korean far-right community site Ilbe Storehouse, known as Ilbe. The agency issued an official statement on May 30 in response to speculation tied to one of his recent fan content videos.

The controversy began with a "set log" video posted on May 17, in which Kim Min-jae appeared with the camera flipped upside down. The footage included a time stamp reading 19:00, or 7 p.m., along with a caption that showed the Korean phrase for "end of stage" written upside down. Around the same time, Kim posted "iya!", a casual expression of excitement, on the fan communication platform Weverse (베리즈 in the source).

Some online users argued that the upside-down framing resembled a practice on Ilbe, where images of late former President Roh Moo-hyun are flipped as a form of mockery. Critics also pointed out that "7 o'clock" is used on the site as slang to demean a specific region of South Korea, and that "iya" has been used there to ridicule the former president. Together, these details fueled the suspicion that Kim was signaling familiarity with the community.

Starship pushed back on that reading. According to the agency, the video was not edited or uploaded by Kim himself but handled through the company's content team.

"The content was produced in the 'set log' format, a new style of communication that has recently become popular, at the suggestion of our content team," Starship said. "Kim Min-jae was not yet familiar with this new filming method, and during the shoot he became confused about the orientation and sent the footage to the staff member in charge with the camera flipped upside down."

The agency said the team discussed whether to reshoot but decided to keep the original take. "We judged that sending the mistakenly inverted video as it was could itself feel like a natural part of the content, so we used it as is," Starship said. "The captions and text in the video were inserted upside down during editing to match the flipped footage. They were not created with any particular meaning or intent. The 19:00 time stamp shown in the video was the actual time the stage ended."

Starship also addressed the Weverse post. "The expression 'iya' written on Weverse was used as a general exclamation," the agency said. "It was used without any awareness that the term is used on a specific site. It has nothing to do with the particular interpretations being raised online. The specific suspicions being raised online are not true, and we want to make clear that there was no intent of any kind."

The company closed with an apology. "We sincerely apologize, both as a company and as the staff involved, for the misunderstanding and discomfort caused by our failure to check carefully during the content production and review process," Starship said. "Going forward, we will conduct more thorough checks and internal review throughout the entire content production and upload process so that similar misunderstandings do not occur."

The episode highlights how closely Korean fans now read short-form idol content for hidden signals.