Record data breach penalty challenged by SK Telecom

Major South Korean telecommunications provider SK Telecom was reported to have taken legal action to rescind the record $91 million penalty imposed by the Personal Information Protection Commission following an April cyberattack that compromised all its 23 million users, according to Yonhap News Agency.

Such a fine, which was decided upon by the Korean data protection regulator after SK Telecom's delayed disclosure of a breach of its servers that exposed all its users' universal subscriber identity module information, is the highest ever given by the agency since its emergence six years ago, exceeding the combined penalty imposed against Meta Platforms and Google in 2022.

SK Telecom is poised to not only emphasize its significant spending and data security reforms following the intrusion, which has not led to financial losses to its subscribers, but also challenge the fairness of the penalty relative to the fine imposed against Meta and Google.