The popularity of the Netflix Series Squid Game is undeniable. It is currently the talk of the town, trending on many social media platforms and as result, plenty of people are streaming the show on Netflix. Apparently, the show is so popular that the number of people streaming Squid Game has managed to cause an intense surge in network traffic, enough that South Korean internet service provider SK Broadband was forced to file a case against Netflix. 

According to Reuters, SK Broadband is currently demanding Netflix to pay for the costs of increased network traffic and maintenance work as a result of the huge bandwidth used by viewers of the popular series Squid Game. SK Broadband said that traffic on its network increased from 50 Gigabits per second (Gbps) in May 2018 to 1,200 Gbps as of September 2021.

Early this year, a Seoul court ruled that Netflix should pay an amount to the internet service provider for network usage. However, Netflix appealed this decision arguing that it has no obligation to pay for any fees because internet service providers should be responsible for managing their networks. Netflix further added that it has contributed to the creation of about 16,000 jobs in South Korea out of its investments costing up to about 770 billion won (Php 30 billion).

For now, Netflix will review SK Broadband’s claim and will work with the network provider so that customers will not be affected. 

Netflix is the second-largest source of network traffic in South Korea, next only to Youtube. The problem is, unlike Amazon, Apple, and Facebook, Netflix doesn’t pay network usage fees to SK Broadband.