Deputy Prime Minister of Science and ICT: "KT Hacking Results to Be Announced Within the Year... Investigation Personnel Deployed to Coupang"

Baek Hanghun, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Science and ICT, announced on December 17 that the final results of the joint public-private investigation into the KT hacking incident will be released within the year.

Minister of Science and ICT Baek Hanghun and Second Vice Minister Ryu Jemyung are conversing at the hearing on the Coupang breach incident held on the 17th at the National Assembly Science, Technology, Information and Broadcasting and Communications Committee. Photo by Kim Hyunmin

On this day, Deputy Prime Minister Baek stated at the National Assembly Science, Technology, Information and Broadcasting and Communications Committee hearing on the Coupang data breach, "We plan to complete the KT investigation as soon as possible and announce the results within the year," adding, "We will deploy as many personnel as possible to the KT hacking investigation in order to expedite the interim announcement of the Coupang investigation."

Deputy Prime Minister Baek explained that the internal Coupang data subject to investigation amounts to 500 terabytes (TB), and that it could reach as much as 1 petabyte (PB, 1,000 TB).

One terabyte, as a digital unit, is equivalent to the information contained in 1,000 volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Deputy Prime Minister Baek also stated that discussions are underway with the Fair Trade Commission regarding whether to suspend Coupang's business operations in relation to the personal information leak incident.