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An executive and employee of an advertising agency who developed and distributed a malicious program that displays pop-up advertisements whenever the smartphone screen is turned on was sentenced to a suspended prison sentence.
On the 28th, Judge Park Min of the 8th Criminal Division of the Seoul Central District Court sentenced Mr. A, the head of an advertising agency, to 8 months in prison and 2 years of probation, who was handed over to trial on charges of violating information and communication networks under the Information and Communications Network Act.
In addition, Mr. B, the development team leader of the same company, was sentenced to 6 months in prison and 2 years of probation, and 3 representatives of the app developer who aided in the distribution of malicious programs were sentenced to a fine of 2 million to 5 million won.
Mr. A and Mr. B developed a software development kit (SDK) for information collection and provided it to 15 smartphone app developers from January to August 2019.
If the SDK is installed on a smartphone, it is possible to collect information such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and app list without user consent, and based on this, Internet advertisements can be displayed.
The developers contracted with Mr. A’s company ensured that the SDK was automatically installed when users downloaded their apps. Users had no idea that the SDK was installed when they installed the app, but Mr. A and Mr. B insisted that “we only provided customized advertisements with the consent of users to receive advertisements.”
However, the court saw them as intruding on users’ information and communication networks. The repeated execution of pop-up advertisements on an unspecified number of smartphones is seen as an infringement done without legitimate access rights.
The court also pointed out that “advertising in this way degrades the performance of smartphones and significantly interferes with normal use.”