리니지 명의도용 소송에 관한 연구

On March 15, 2006, about 10,000 plaintiffs, claiming that their personal informations were illegally used, brought a suit against NCsoft Corporation and its representative director for damages. The Seoul Central District Court gave the following decision on May 31, 2007. The defendant has the duty of care to not aid in the appropriation of the personal informations. However, since the defendant has properly fulfilled its duty of care to not aid in the illegal use of their names, it is not responsible for aiding and abetting in the illegal use. In this thesis, I compare the ruling in this case to the Supreme Court of Korea ruling on aiding and abetting due to employer’s fault, the Supreme Court of Korea ruling on aiding and abetting by the Soribada operators, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the Grokster, Ltd. case. According to the subject ruling, the appropriation of the personal informations in this case seems to be the first instance where the informations were used illegally on a large scale to sign up for membership. Before the massive illegal use of names became a problem, the defendant, in its terms and conditions, prevented the trading of items except in the game and moved on to seizing hundreds of thousands of accounts. After the massive illegal use of names became a problem, it informed the investigative authority and fulfilled its duty of care by enforcing mobile phone confirmation. Since it is certain that the defendant took various measures to prevent the illegal use of names, when the Supreme Court’s legal principle on aiding and abetting due to employer’s fault and its legal principle on aiding and abetting by the Soribada operators are applied in this case, it is likely that the defendant will not be held liable for the illegal acts done by those who made illegal use of names. According to the de facto relationship in the subject ruling, it is difficult to conclude that most members signed up making illegal use of other’s name, the defendant took necessary steps to prevent the infringement of the users’ personal information, and it is unreasonable to assume that the defendant sees a profit increase as more users infringe on others’ personal information. If the legal principle of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the Grokster case is applied in the Lineage case, it is very likely that the defendant will not be held liable for the illegal acts done by those who made illegal use of names.