SK Hynix Worker Jail for Stealing Chip Tech

A Korean court has jailed a former employee of SK Hynix, a local chip conglomerate, for stealing critical semiconductor technology before quitting to work for China’s Huawei.

The 36-year-old woman, who is a Chinese national, was accused of printing about 4,000 pages of technical documents on “solutions to semiconductor manufacturing process issues” over four days at SK Hynix’s Shanghai office just before she resigned, according to Korea Bizwire, which cited a statement by the Yeoju branch of Suwon District Court.

“The court rejected her claim that she printed the documents, which contained technology designated as core national technology in 2022, for study purposes and to facilitate [a] work handover,” it said.

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The woman, who was not named, was found guilty of violating the country’s Industrial Technology Protection Act. She was sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined 20 million won ($14,206) for misappropriating critical chip technology.

The court, near Seoul, described her actions at SK Hynix’s office in Shanghai, which was said to have “relatively lax security”, as “highly unusual,” noting that she was suspected to have removed the documents in batches and concealed them in a backpack and shopping bags.

“The court suggested that the defendant’s subsequent employment at Huawei indicated she likely intended to use the materials to prove her value to her new employer.”

The woman returned to Seoul in 2022 before taking up a higher-paid position at Huawei. But she received a relatively lenient sentence, the report said, because there was no clear evidence the stolen technology had been utilized, and SK Hynix had not demonstrated any specific damage.

SK Hynix was said to maintain strict security and did not allow the use of storage devices such as USB drives, and usually records details of printed materials, it said.

The court report is the latest example of the extraordinary international rivalry for tech dominance between China, the US and its allies, such as South Korea, the Netherlands and Japan.

In late October, TSMC, the world’s top chipmaker, informed the US that Huawei had got around US export controls by using a chip it sent to another customer in a new AI accelerator.

That led to TSMC telling its customers in China it would not be able to ship its most advanced artificial intelligence chips – 7 nanometres and above – from November 11.