Netflix had to swiftly intervene after an oversight in Squid Game season 1 nearly derailed one woman’s life.
The South Korean dystopian thriller, which became a global sensation, inadvertently displayed a real phone number during its first season. This detail, showcased in episode one, led to thousands of prank calls and messages to the unsuspecting owner, Kim Gil-young from Seongju, South Korea.
In the scene, Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) receives a mysterious business card bearing an eight-digit number. When viewers added South Korea’s mobile prefix (010), they discovered the number actually belonged to Gil-young, who had been using it for over a decade.
Following the show’s explosive success in 90 countries, Gil-young began receiving constant calls and texts from curious fans. “I’ve been receiving texts and calls 24 hours a day, to the point where it’s difficult to live my daily life,” she told Money Today. “There are more than 4,000 numbers I’ve had to delete.”
With her phone battery depleting rapidly and no option to change the number due to business use, Gil-young reached out to Netflix and production company Siren Pictures for help. Within weeks, the streaming giant digitally altered the scenes, replacing the phone number with the fictitious 010-034.
Netflix also issued a statement urging fans to stop making prank calls and messages. In Squid Game season 2, which continues three years after the first season’s events, Netflix and Siren took extra precautions to ensure no real phone numbers were used.
Squid Game season 2 is currently streaming on Netflix, with fans eager to see the next chapter in the high-stakes drama.