디지털 계약에서 개인 데이터의 보호

As technology advances, we are willing to provide personal data to access digital services we once perceived as free. There are active discussions about the need for user protection regulations in digital contracts that provide personal data in return. In terms of Personal Information Protection, Europe and Korea already have high-level laws and systems in place. Treating personal data as a subject of performance can create a conflict between contractual autonomy and fundamental human rights regarding personal data. In response to this debate, EU and German legislators have granted consumers who enter into digital contracts with money and those who enter into digital contracts with personal data nearly equal rights. German Civil Code guarantees data protection rights and the freedom to express one's intentions regarding data protection. Furthermore, by granting businesses the right to terminate a contract when consumers exercise their data protection rights, it provides a basis for balancing the interests of the contracting parties. In Korea, discussions on the contractual aspect of providing personal data for digital products are relatively inactive. There was an opportunity to incorporate digital contracts into the Civil Code through the 2022 Civil Code amendment, but the revision failed. Separate from fundamental rights-based personal information protection, discussions on personal data as a means of payment and data law are necessary.