All of this comes from Korean government sources: KOSIS, e-나라지표 indicator 2708, and the Ministry of Health and Welfare's annual Adoption Day releases. Counts are children whose adoption was finalised by court approval in that year.
A note on the big number: 250,540 is domestic and overseas combined since 1958. You will often see "over 200,000" quoted for overseas adoptees alone — that figure is used by GOA'L, KoRoot and international press, while Korea's own overseas tally through 2025 is 168,588. Different start years and different counting rules explain the gap. Both are real; neither is a typo.
In 2025, 90 of 140 children (64.3%) were born to unmarried parents, 29 (20.7%) were recorded as abandoned, and 21 (15%) fell under protected birth or other categories. The single largest driver of Korean adoption is not poverty or disaster. It is the position of unmarried mothers in Korean society, which is why KUMFA, the Korean unwed mothers' association, belongs in any honest reading of these numbers.
Korea's Truth and Reconciliation Commission found human rights violations in intercountry adoption: adoptions without lawful birth-parent consent, falsified records including fake orphan family registers, guardian notification treated as an empty formality, deliberate identity substitution when a child in process died, inadequate vetting of adoptive parents, children exported to match demand, and coerced "donations." It was the first time a Korean state body acknowledged state responsibility. Of 367 complaints, 56 were recognised.
The public adoption system took effect. All adoption records moved to NCRC; agencies no longer answer record requests.
Korea ratified the Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption, one of the commission's recommendations.
The 3rd Basic Plan for Child Policy (2025–2029) declared a phased halt to overseas adoption, targeting zero by 2029. It was the first time the government officially declared an end to it.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission relaunched with a specific focus on adoption fraud. Previously suspended cases are being reviewed and new applications are accepted; more than 300 adoptees have filed in the renewed probe. The commission is also consulting with Norway's own adoption inquiry.