Former SK Hynix employee Mr. Jin was sentenced to imprisonment for leaking CIS (CMOS Image Sensor, a semiconductor device that converts light into digital signals) technology.
On October 31, Mr. Jin was sentenced to 1 year and 6 months in prison for violating the Unfair Competition Prevention and Trade Secret Protection Act (leaking trade secrets overseas) and breaching his fiduciary duty.
Mr. Jin worked as an on-site employee at SK Hynix’s Shanghai office and was accused of unauthorizedly photographing 170 confidential documents (totaling 5,900 pages) and leaking them to obtain a new job.
The defendant exploited loopholes to leak a large number of trade secrets and disclosed these confidential documents to a Chinese company.
He gained an unspecified amount of economic benefits and caused significant losses.
Mr. Jin joined SK Hynix in November 2016, responsible for quality assurance and customer support for related products.
He signed an agreement promising not to disclose or use any trade secrets learned during his employment for any purpose outside of work.
In February 2022, while still employed, Mr. Jin received a job offer from a certain company and leaked trade secrets related to CIS technology.
Over five months, he took 5,900 photos containing trade secrets.
He emailed some of the photos along with his resume to the company that offered him employment.
The leaked data included CIS and hybrid bonding technology.
Hybrid bonding technology is an advanced technique that bonds multiple NAND flash wafers or CIS chips together.
The court noted that Mr. Jin’s actions in leaking technology could undermine national competitiveness.
The aforementioned trade secrets were developed by SK Hynix with significant investment of time, manpower, and resources.
If such technology is leaked to foreign competitors, it could not only cause significant losses to the company but also weaken national competitiveness.
Therefore, the defendant should be severely punished.
However, Mr. Jin was not charged with violating the Industrial Technology Protection Act (ITPA).
ITPA only protects core national technologies, advanced technologies, and advanced products, and the court ruled that the “hybrid bonding” technology leaked in this case did not violate this law.
Based on the scope of advanced technologies and products, TSV-based 3D integration is included in the category of advanced technologies and products in the semiconductor industry.
SK Hynix believes that hybrid bonding technology falls under TSV-based 3D integration, but the court disagreed.
The court ruled: “There is no indication that the materials in this case contain technology within the protected categories of advanced technology as defined by the Industrial Development Law.”