Bae's day job is in construction. After work, he runs his website. He told reporters that he posted a photo on the site that was taken of him last year in a rural area of South Korea.
The snapshot of him in a white T-shirt earned him a nickname among friends: "General Secretary Kim Jong Il."
During a broadcast Wednesday, Japan's TV Asahi said the station had received information from an unnamed source who had met the younger Kim numerous times. It said the source told it that the authenticity of the photo was "90%."
The station superimposed the eyes of Kim Jong Il over the sunglasses in the photo to enhance the likeness.
"His fleshy face and shape look just like Kim Jong Il," a newsreader commented. "Also, there's a unique hairstyle with full volume that resembles his father's. . . . Aren't big sunglasses the tradition of the North Korean royal family?"
A day after its "scoop," TV Asahi retracted its claim to having an exclusive image of the young man.
"We have come to believe that there is high probability that the picture is of another person," it said.
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john.glionna@latimes.com
Park is a news assistant in The Times' Seoul Bureau.
