Former SK Hynix Employee Who Leaked Core HBM Technology Acquitted of Part of Charges Because It Was Not Classified as Advanced Technology at the Time

A former SK Hynix employee who leaked core technology required for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) implementation to move to a Chinese semiconductor company has been partially acquitted on the grounds that the technology was not classified as advanced technology at the time of the crime.

Kim, who had worked at SK Hynix since 2016, received a job offer in February 2022 from HiSilicon, a subsidiary of China's largest telecommunications equipment manufacturer Huawei.

Determined to change jobs, Kim violated internal security regulations and printed and photographed technical data related to CMOS Image Sensors (CIS), semiconductor devices that convert light into digital signals, with the intention of using them in a resume.

Kim also took an SK Hynix work laptop to a remote work location and photographed trade secret materials using an iPad.

Investigations showed that a total of 6,070 pages of data were unauthorizedly leaked during this process.

Kim cited some of the leaked materials in a resume submitted to the Chinese company, ultimately leaking them to the firm.

The first-instance court, which tried Kim on charges of violating the Act on Prevention of Divulgence and Protection of Industrial Technology, ruled that most of Kim's actions constituted the leakage of trade secrets.

The court recognized that most of the CIS-related data leaked by Kim were the fruits of SK Hynix's long-term investment of human and material resources.

However, the court acquitted Kim regarding a specific technology.

The materials leaked by Kim included data related to "hybrid bonding," a technology drawing attention as necessary for implementing HBM for artificial intelligence. The court ruled that data related to this technology were not included in the "Scope of Advanced Technologies and Products" notified by the Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy.

Although the prosecution appealed the ruling, the second-instance court reached the same conclusion.

The court based its decision on the fact that the certificate of confirmation for advanced technology products for the technology in question was issued only in February 2023, after the crime of technology leakage had occurred, judging that it could not be viewed as a technology requiring protection at the time of the offense.

Ultimately, the appellate court upheld the first-instance sentence of 1 year and 6 months in prison, maintaining the guilty verdict for Kim's mass leakage of trade secrets and disclosure to a Chinese competitor, while dismissing the prosecution's appeal regarding the hybrid bonding technology leakage.

(Reported by Kim Jiuk | Video by Na Hong-hee | Graphics by Lee Jung-joo | Produced by SBS Digital News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.