Collaborating with Society Through Services

Through services utilized by many of its users, LY Corporation (the “Company”) tackles issues surrounding climate change, natural capital, and resource recycling. In its efforts against climate change, the Group works on initiatives for transforming into a societal structure that emits fewer greenhouse gases (mitigation), and for natural disasters that have become more frequent and severe (adaption). As damage from disasters grow ever larger in recent times, the Company has been cooperating with local governments and relevant organizations not only on disaster prevention and mitigation, but also reconstruction efforts. LY Corporation also carries out initiatives on enriching its recycling-oriented services and conserving natural capital, aiming to make a sustainable society into a reality.

Services for a Decarbonized Society

Aiming to further enrich users’ everyday lives and society as a whole, LY Corporation has been forging ahead with initiatives that presenting environmentally conscious options.

The Company will continue with its efforts to achieve a decarbonized society through an even larger number of its services.

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Choosing Environmentally Friendly Routes with Yahoo! JAPAN Maps, Yahoo! JAPAN Car Navigation, and Yahoo! JAPAN Transit Navigation

Yahoo! JAPAN Maps, Yahoo! JAPAN Car Navigation (a driving route planning app), and Yahoo! JAPAN Transit Navigation (an app for searching public transport connections) began offering a feature that lets users check the CO₂ emissions for a particular route and choose more eco-friendly journeys. The feature is available for all three services on both iOS and Android.
With Yahoo! JAPAN Maps and Yahoo! JAPAN Car Navigation, users can search driving routes and check the different tabs—"Recommended,” “Use Highways,” and “No Highways”^*1—to see how much CO₂ emissions each route would cause based on its distance, slope, and other information. This can help users be habitually conscious of CO₂ emissions and give them cleaner routes to choose from when not in a hurry, or able to take the more environmentally conscious option.
Both Yahoo! JAPAN Maps and Yahoo! JAPAN Transit Navigation also display an “Eco Mark” on routes that emit the least amount of CO₂, instantly communicating to users the greenest way to travel and making them routinely pay attention to emissions.

*1 Tab names in the Yahoo! JAPAN Maps app. Yahoo! JAPAN Car Navigation uses different names such as “Highways” and “Normal Roads.”

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Collaboration with Local Governments and Supporting Organizations against Natural Disasters Associated with Climate Change

As climate change-induced natural disasters become increasingly severe and frequent, LY Corporation has been cooperating with local governments and supporting organizations to quickly respond and minimize damage when a disaster occurs.

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Disaster Alliance

LY Corporation concludes alliances with local governments with the aim of providing residents with timely disaster information in the event of a disaster. The Company provides a cached site for the websites operated by the municipalities that have signed the alliances. By placing the cached sites on the Company's server, local governments can avoid having too much access to their server and therefore are able to continuously deliver disaster-related information. The Company also provides a function that enables local governments to send out critical emergency information, such as early warnings and shelter information, directly to people through the Yahoo! JAPAN and Yahoo! JAPAN Disaster Alert apps. Also, by showing evacuation areas on Yahoo! JAPAN's maps, LY Corporation contributes to raising awareness towards disaster prevention even during normal times.
In 2023, the Company also concluded agreements with all 47 prefectures of Japan on disseminating disaster-related information, etc. (disaster alliances).

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Delivery of Disaster Information through Yahoo! JAPAN Top Page and Yahoo! JAPAN Apps

To reduce the number of victims in the face of increasingly intense disasters, Yahoo! JAPAN Top Page and apps such as Yahoo! JAPAN for smartphones, Yahoo! JAPAN Disaster Alert, and Yahoo! JAPAN Weather, display information on earthquakes, tsunamis, and heavy rains. Especially, through collaborations with the Japanese government and local governments, the Yahoo! JAPAN Disaster Alert app promptly sends push notifications on all kinds of disasters, including earthquake early warnings, tsunami information, heavy rain hazard levels, heavy rain forecast, and information on landslides, river floods, heatstroke, volcanoes, and civil protection. In addition, the app provides a disaster map function that enables users to share the status of disasters and lifelines in their current locations, to facilitate prompt evacuation actions.
By displaying warnings and alerts for rivers and the changes in water levels measured at observation stations every 10 minutes on a map, Yahoo! JAPAN Weather provides river level information that enables early decisions on voluntary evacuation. In addition, the rain cloud radar provides real-time information on the movement of rain clouds, which prepares users for torrential rains. The rain cloud radar also has additional visual features that show areas with linear rainbands and their movement, aiming to ensure users are on guard against heavy rain and spur them to quickly take action to protect themselves.

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Yahoo! JAPAN Search

According to data from Yahoo! JAPAN Search, there is a noticeable increase in searches combining location names with disaster-related terms—such as “Evacuation information [City name]” or “[City name] warning”— during typhoons. This indicates a strong demand for local disaster information. To meet this need, when users search for " [municipality name] disaster" on Yahoo! JAPAN Search, the search results page displays a consolidated view of useful information, including evacuation notices and weather warnings; and advisories issued for that area. Evacuation information includes alert levels and target areas such as emergency safety measures and evacuation orders, while disaster information covers weather warnings, advisories, landslide alerts, designated river flood forecasts, and related information such as earthquake, tsunami, power outage, typhoon, and public information issued by local governments and other authorities. If location settings are enabled, simply searching "disaster" will display information for the current location, allowing users to quickly access helpful information during a disaster, even when away from home.

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Yahoo! JAPAN Daily Life

Yahoo! JAPAN Daily Life offers "emergency information from municipalities" which enables municipalities that have signed disaster alliances (mentioned above) with LY Corporation to distribute emergency information, crime prevention alerts, news, and more to users. Currently, disaster alliances are in place with approximately 1,600 municipalities nationwide. These municipalities can disseminate information through the Yahoo! JAPAN app and the Yahoo! JAPAN Disaster Alert app, allowing users to receive information relevant to their designated regions.

When a disaster occurs, municipalities input "shelter opening information" into L-ALERT, a common platform for conveying necessary information to local residents through media such as broadcasters and app providers. This automatically triggers push notifications to users. As part of the "emergency information from municipalities" service provided by Yahoo! JAPAN Daily Life, these notifications are sent to users of the Yahoo! JAPAN app and the Yahoo! JAPAN Disaster Alert app, allowing them to receive information relevant to their registered areas.

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Collaboration with Society through Provision of Disaster Prevention/Mitigation Services and More

LY Corporation as a company that provides media and social networking services to many users in disaster-prone Japan, develops various services and provides content aimed at disaster prevention and mitigation. The Company aims to create “a future where more lives are saved in every scene of every disaster."

Leveraging the LINE Communication App During Disasters

Recognizing that there needed to be some way for people to contact their loved ones, the LINE communication app came into existence in June 2011 after many found themselves unable to reach their family and friends by telephone and email during the Great East Japan Earthquake. Along with a variety of features for users to use during a disaster and other emergencies, local governments and other bodies also use the app as a disaster response tool.

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Provision of Special Content on Disaster Preparedness

Aiming to create “a future where more lives are saved in every scene of every disaster,” LY Corporation provides information in various formats such as articles, quizzes, and videos to promote easy-to-understand awareness of disaster preparedness.

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Yahoo! JAPAN News

With the aim of communicating disaster prevention knowledge in a simple manner and helping as many users as possible to acquire life-saving knowledge, Yahoo! JAPAN News works with the Japan Meteorological Agency to disseminate disaster prevention and other educational information using infographics* which are published on Yahoo! JAPAN News. Through such measures, the Company endeavor to deliver the needed information in a timely manner. Starting in 2024, the Company is advancing initiatives in collaboration with the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism.

*Simple diagrams and illustrations used to show data and information.

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Yahoo! JAPAN Weather & Disaster

Yahoo! JAPAN Weather & Disaster offers the "Disaster Calendar," which allows users to easily view past disaster records collected from news agencies and municipalities in a calendar format.

Additionally, Yahoo! JAPAN Disaster Alert (iOS & Android version) and Yahoo! JAPAN Weather & Disaster (browser version) are provide the "Disaster Prevention Timeline " nationwide, to help users prepare for earthquakes, tsunamis and floods. Users can input some simple information in advance to check suitable disaster prevention actions. To leave nobody behind from evacuation in the event of a disaster, the "Disaster Prevention Timeline" provides users with push notifications on when to start acting to prepare for disasters.

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Yell Market

Yell Market was launched as a "Recovery Department Store" in December 2011, in the wake of the Great East Japan Earthquake. It currently serves as a shopping medium that "delivers support,” conveying the feelings of shoppers wanting to protect their loved ones from a disaster or wanting to help reconstruction efforts in disaster-affected areas.

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Initiatives on Enhancing Recycling-Oriented Services and Conserving Natural Capital

LY Corporation aims to create a sustainable society by building a recycling-oriented society that saves resources and reduces waste, working on projects that leverage its services’ unique characteristics to solve issues.

Providing Recycling-Oriented Services Through the Reuse Businesses of Yahoo! JAPAN Auction and Yahoo! JAPAN Flea Market

As part of its efforts to provide low-carbon products and services, LY Corporation offers Yahoo! JAPAN Auction and Yahoo! JAPAN Flea Market in its e-commerce reuse business to help realize a recycling-oriented society. Reuse of goods leads to reductions in the amount of new resources consumed, elimination of CO₂ emissions associated with manufacturing, and also reductions in waste. Each of these platforms focuses also on charity projects and social contributions.
Since 2023, the Company has been a member of the Japan Reuse Affairs Association, a general incorporated association. With this, LY Corporation will strengthen initiatives to build a recycling-oriented society that further reduces its impact on the environment.

Yahoo! JAPAN Auction

Launched in September 1999, Yahoo! JAPAN Auction, is one of Japan's largest online auction and flea market apps, which enabled the online C2C trading of goods. It strives to take part in the establishment of a recycling society through the promotion of "reuse" by facilitating the sale of goods no longer in use to someone who needs the item.

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Yahoo! JAPAN Flea Market

Launched in October 2019, Yahoo! JAPAN Flea Market is an app that specializes in flea market-type transactions. In this app, individuals can easily trade goods at fixed price.
In collaboration with Yahoo! JAPAN Auction which offers auction deals, the Company endeavors to further develop its business in sustainable secondary distribution.

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