The judgment below

The conviction part is reversed, and that part of the case is remanded to the Seoul Central District Court Panel Division.

The grounds of appeal are examined.

1. Whether a mark indicating another person's goods is widely known in the Republic of Korea under Article 2 subparagraph 1 (a) of the Unfair Competition Prevention and Trade Secret Protection Act (hereinafter "the Unfair Competition Prevention Act") is based on the period of use, method, pattern, quantity of goods used, scope of transaction, etc., actual condition of goods transaction, and whether it is objectively widely known under social norms (see, e.g., Supreme Court Decisions 2003Do7827, Apr. 13, 2006; 2007Do10562, Sept. 11, 2008). In the meantime, where a certain type of goods is acquired with the function of indicating the origin and its well-knownness, it constitutes "mark indicating another person's goods widely known in the Republic of Korea" under Article 2 subparagraph 1 (a) of the Unfair Competition Prevention and Trade Secret Protection Act and thus, it can be protected by the same Act. To this end, compared to other similar goods, it should be sufficiently distinguishable from the specific type of goods to the extent that general consumers have specific or exclusive character of goods.

(See Supreme Court Decision 2006Do1157 Decided July 13, 2007, and Supreme Court Decision 2006Do267 Decided November 29, 2007, etc.). 2. According to the evidence duly adopted and examined by the lower court, the victim MFL & IT Co., Ltd (hereinafter “victim Co., Ltd”) manufactures and sells “TFL&IT products” with the trademark “on July 2004” (hereinafter “the trademark of this case”).