K-pop girl group Momoland member Nancy is suffering great distress as photos of her changing outfits at an awards ceremony in Vietnam circulated online.
Nancy served as one of the emcees of the 2019 Asia Artist Awards (AAA) held on Nov. 26, 2019 at the My Dinh National Stadium in Hanoi. Other emcees were Super Junior’s Leeteuk, actress Lim Ji-yeon and actor Ahn Hyo-seop.
Korean media reported that illegally filmed videos and photos of her are spreading online. The report stated that a local staff member took a video of Nancy.
MLD Entertainment and the organizing committee of the AAA issued statements regarding the issue.
“Recently, photoshopped hidden camera photographs of Nancy are being spread online. Nancy is a victim of a photo that was taken in secret and then illegally manipulated,” said MLD Entertainment, SBS News reported.
It added, “The person to be protected is no other than Nancy. We ask for your cooperation. We will be taking strong legal action against the person who took the photo, the original spreader, as well as everyone who spreads the photo.”
“We will also be going through our legal steps to file suits for sexual harassment as well as the spread of illicit photos. Nancy is currently suffering from a great amount of mental distress. We hope there will be no more malicious posts related to our artist,” the agency added.
On Twitter, fans are reporting accounts that are posting Nancy’s photos and are asking people not to spread the photos.
The AAA organizing committee also issued a statement to say that it is expressing deep regret that illegally manipulated photos of Nancy were distributed online and on social media.
They are apologizing to Nancy and vowed to cooperate with law enforcement authorities in Vietnam and South Korea. The committee also said it will cooperate with MLD Entertainment in monitoring the malicious posts.