On the night of Dec. 3, just minutes after President Yoon Suk Yeol's shocking declaration of martial law, dozens of elite military commandos descended on an obscure office building on the outskirts of Seoul. Their target was the headquarters of the National Election Commission -- the country's otherwise staid bureaucratic body that oversees elections.

The raid proved anticlimactic -- the commandos only managed to snap a few photos of internal server systems before retreating, failing to compromise any voting data. But the incident pulled back the curtain on something far more unsettling: how a parallel universe of online conspiracy theories, cultivated on the fringes of South Korea’s social media, had made its way into the country’s highest corridors of power.

The next day, then Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun -- now under arrest for insurrection charges -- admitted to ordering troops to seize servers related to the election upon Yoon's orders. The troops were to look for servers containing data on the 2020 and 2024 parliamentary elections, both of which had given the progressive opposition majority control.

Though law enforcement authorities and the Supreme Court had repeatedly thrown out these claims of voter fraud, conspiracy theories continue to run wild on what Koreans dismissively call "denture-tube" ("teul-tube") -- a constellation of right-wing YouTube channels that enjoy a particularly avid following among older conservative viewers.

"My friends blast these videos in our group chats practically 24/7," says Kang, an 85-year-old Gyeonggi Province resident, who asked to be identified only by her surname. She describes a social environment where refusing to engage with conspiracy theories about rigged elections and North Korean spies leads to swift ostracism. "They mock me as a leftist commie when I don't play along," she says.

The ecosystem that shapes Kang's senior social circle represents a distinctly Korean spin on a global phenomenon. Here, right-wing YouTube personalities don't just command massive followings -- they've built something akin to digital fiefdoms, where live chat sections overflow with supportive messages and donations, primarily from retirees with time and disposable income. Comment sections form echo chambers where even mild skepticism gets shouted down.

These channels follow the typical playbook of reactionary media worldwide, resonating especially with older South Koreans steeped in Cold War-era anxieties. They offer black-and-white narratives blending cultural nostalgia and anti-communist rhetoric, often portraying North Korean operatives as hidden infiltrators lurking at every level of government. Their hosts pose as crusading truth-tellers exposing what they paint as treasonous collusion between progressives and foreign adversaries, all while prominently displaying their bank account numbers for donations.

"I send donations during livestreams, maybe $10 or $20 at a time, to show my support," says a 65-year-old psychiatrist who regularly tunes into a political commentary channel with 1.8 million subscribers. Speaking on condition of anonymity, she describes herself as a proud conservative who "loves her country" and has lost all faith in mainstream media.

"I can’t stand the left-wing media's grip on this country," she claims.

As of May 2024, five leading right-wing YouTube channels boast over a million subscribers each, with another 14 surpassing the 500,000 mark.

Increasingly outlandish conspiracy theories have found fertile ground in these outlets. Some claimed that the 2022 Itaewon Halloween crowd crush that killed 159 people was orchestrated by undercover enemy forces to undermine Yoon's presidency. Others insist that the January assassination attempt on opposition leader Lee Jae-myoung -- who survived a knife attack to his neck -- was staged.

While mainstream conservative politicians have traditionally kept these conspiracy-minded influencers at arm's length, the current administration's coziness with these fringe voices has occasionally surfaced in notable ways.

Some right-wing YouTubers even scored invites to Yoon's inauguration, and long-circulating rumors about Yoon's own viewing habits gained new credibility after last week's crisis. Recently, an appointee tapped to head civil servant training was revealed to have run a YouTube channel pushing claims about Chinese Communist infiltration of local politics -- content he promptly deleted after his appointment.

"We're seeing something exceptional here, with few parallels in the developed world," says Lee Jong-myung, a senior media researcher at Sungkyunkwan University. He traces the phenomenon back to the 2016 impeachment of former President Park Geun-hye, which left many conservatives in the country feeling betrayed by mainstream media.

"That's when the right wing really started their exodus to YouTube, where they found voices willing to tell them what they wanted to hear. The phenomenon later spread to left-wing circles as well, creating an increasingly polarized media landscape."

Last week's martial law declaration sent these channels into overdrive. One prominent YouTuber with 919,000 subscribers -- who claims Yoon watches his videos every night -- quickly praised the move and declared the raid on the election commission "a game changer." Another influencer, recently tapped as a state radio host despite his history of hard-right commentary, urged ruling party lawmakers to block impeachment efforts and "reorganize the war front against voter fraud."

The success of these antics is reflected in their earnings. Two right-wing political commentators dominated YouTube earnings in South Korea last November, ranking first and second in "super chat" donations with $49,000 and $44,600 respectively, according to analytics platform Playboard. These earnings placed them among the YouTube's top dozen channels worldwide in terms of most super chatted channels.

Content posted on their channels relies heavily on clickbait thumbnails and sensationalist headlines making demonstrably false claims. Their latest lies include: Supposed US government statements dismissing insurrection charges against martial law participants, and fake warnings from Washington that Yoon's impeachment would place Korea under Chinese and North Korean control.

At a fundamental level, there's the platform's well-documented machinery working behind the scenes -- algorithms and monetization systems -- that fuels this spiral into extremism. "The incentive structure of these social media platforms is quite simple," Lee explains. "More extreme content attracts more engaged viewers, who reward creators with both views and direct donations. This creates a feedback loop pushing everything toward the fringes."

"Unlike traditional newsrooms with editorial standards and fact-checking processes, these channels operate without any real accountability," Lee notes. "They can make wild claims one day and simply move on to new conspiracies the next, while their audience revels in each new revelation."

"What's particularly concerning is how these spaces create a false consensus," says Lee. "Viewers surrounded only by like-minded commenters begin to believe their views represent the mainstream, rather than a radical fringe."