A. misunderstanding of legal principles: Two files sent by Defendant A to Defendant B by e-mail (hereinafter “instant files”) constitute “business secrets” under Article 2 subparag. 2 of the Unfair Competition Prevention Act.

However, the lower court erred by misapprehending the legal doctrine and thereby adversely affecting the conclusion of the judgment, since it acquitted the Defendants on this part of the facts charged.

B. The sentence of the lower court (six months of imprisonment and two years of suspended execution) is deemed to be too uneasy and unfair.

2. Judgment on the misapprehension of legal principles

A. In full view of the following circumstances, the lower court held that the evidence submitted by the prosecutor alone was objectively recognizable that the instant files are kept confidential by the victimized company.

It is difficult to recognize otherwise, and it is difficult to readily conclude that the instant files constitute “business secrets” under Article 2 subparag. 2 of the Act on the Prevention of Unfair Competition, which has been kept confidential by reasonable efforts of the victimized company.

The decision was determined.

① In the case of a victimized company, there was no internal regulation stipulating the management of trade secrets, and there was no confidential indication on the instant files, etc., and there was no objective standard for classification or management between the instant files and non-trade secrets.

② Although the injured company was a middle-standing company with annual sales of 22 billion won and 103 employees, it is difficult to find out the circumstances that the victimized company designated a security officer to provide security education for the management and protection of business secrets to its employees, including the Defendants.

(3) In addition, a victimized company shall not install a security program on a computer used by its employees to prevent the divulgence of trade secrets, and shall connect each employee’s computer.