Korea to track private ambulances in real time from Oct. 14

The health ministry said Wednesday that private ambulance operators must begin transmitting GPS-based trip information in real time from Oct. 14, a step aimed at preventing the misuse of vehicles that have come to be known as "fake ambulances." Under the enforcement rules of the Emergency Medical Service Act, operators of emergency patient transport services and the Daehan Inmyeong Gujodan, a social welfare foundation that runs ambulances, must send data collected by each vehicle's driving recorder to the Ambulance Record Management System (AiR) as it is generated.

The ministry said the measure is intended to stop inappropriate use of private ambulances, including trips for personal purposes unrelated to patient transport. Until now, authorities compared GPS records stored in vehicles with trip documents after the fact, which limited their ability to assess how ambulances were actually being driven and to confirm violations.

Information on each ambulance's location, route and operating hours will be collected and managed in real time by the AiR system, which is operated by the National Emergency Medical Center, and used to check whether trips are appropriate and to support inspections by local governments.

The ministry is currently collecting and accumulating trip information. In 2027, it plans to add a function that automatically detects suspected irregular trips and notifies officials at the responsible administrative agency.

Separately, the ministry is working to link insurance enrollment data held by the Korea Insurance Development Institute and insurance companies so that it can verify at all times whether ambulances carry the mandatory liability and comprehensive coverage. Periodic checks of insurance certificates have made it difficult to catch practices such as canceling a policy after an inspection.

"This enforcement has great significance in that it has laid the groundwork for electronically verifying and managing ambulance operations, raising the effectiveness of oversight of 'fake ambulances,'" said Lee Jung-kyu, the ministry's public health policy director. "We will continue to reinforce the system's functions and closely inspect inappropriate operations to build a patient transport system that the public can use with confidence."