Ministry of Culture and Copyright Commission Launch 'AI-Copyright System Improvement Council'

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced that, together with the Korea Copyright Commission, it launched the '2025 Artificial Intelligence (AI)-Copyright System Improvement Consultative Body (Working Group)' on the 19th at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, and held the first meeting chaired by First Vice Minister Yong Ho-seong.

The emergence of generative AI, represented by ChatGPT, has raised expectations for the use of AI as a content creation tool, while also causing concerns from the perspective of copyright protection, such as unauthorized use of training data and copyright infringement by AI-generated outputs.

In response, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism established and operated the public-private 'AI-Copyright System Improvement Consultative Body (Working Group)' in 2023 to address newly emerging copyright issues in the AI era and published the 'Generative AI Copyright Guide.' Last year, the consultative body was divided into the training data subcommittee and output subcommittee to discuss a wide range of copyright-related issues, including the use of works as training data, recognition of copyright in AI outputs, and responses to copyright infringement.

Yong Hoseong, the 1st Vice Minister of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, is speaking at the launch ceremony of the '2025 AI-Copyright System Improvement Council' held on the 19th at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, Jongno-gu.
Photo by Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Yonhap News Agency

As a result of the discussions, it was judged that the impact on the industry is extensive, and key issues requiring consensus on legal and institutional improvement measures were identified. Among these, the criteria for copyright registration of creative works using AI outputs and the determination of copyright infringement of AI outputs will be addressed in related guides to be distributed in the first half of this year.

This year, the consultative body will be divided into three subcommittees?'AI Training Data System,' 'Activation of AI Training Data Transactions,' and 'Utilization of AI Outputs'?to broadly collect opinions on tasks requiring further discussion and to derive practical solutions.

The AI Training Data System Subcommittee (Subcommittee 1) will address issues related to 'disclosure of AI training data lists' and the 'introduction of text and data mining (TDM) exemption regulations.' Relevant ministries, stakeholders, and private experts will participate as members, and the results of the discussions will be finalized through the National AI Committee and others.

The AI Training Data Transaction Activation Subcommittee (Subcommittee 2) will support negotiations between AI developers and rights holders to derive market-referable transaction cases. The small subcommittees, organized by field (genre), will survey the willingness to trade and desired transaction conditions of both parties, arrange negotiation opportunities based on this, and support the conclusion of agreements. Each small subcommittee will be composed including expert members with specialization in each field, and in cases of sharp conflicts between the parties, the full meeting, including members with expertise in copyright usage fees and related matters, will seek reasonable alternatives together.

The AI Outputs Utilization Subcommittee (Subcommittee 3) will review the guides presenting the copyright registration criteria for creative works using AI and the criteria for determining copyright infringement of AI outputs, scheduled for publication in the first half of the year. In the second half, it plans to discuss advanced topics related to output labeling, registration, and infringement.

Vice Minister Yong Ho-seong stated, "While legal judgments regarding AI and copyright are necessary, the process of actively collecting field opinions is very important," and added, "We will establish copyright policy directions reflecting diverse voices from the field."