You're right, but they made it stupid difficult to move in and out.  What was it? Some test you needed to take, a day or two before you could leave? And if you failed that(but you already paid for the airfare) at the airport, they could restrict you from travel.

Hamstr

Personal_Finance

if bitcoin became illegal by law

For the record, S Korea never stopped anyone from leaving the country during Covid, AFAIK. It was just a lot of paperwork, proof of vaccination, etc... that made it not worth it to travel for most. But you could still travel if you wanted to. Just to be factual about this point, not to disagree about the actual gist of your message.