Kakao’s former Chief Investment Officer Bae Jae-hyun has filed a lawsuit against Mirae Asset Securities, seeking compensation for a hack of his account that allegedly resulted in losses of 11 billion won ($7.5 million).
According to industry sources, Bae filed a lawsuit last month against Mirae Asset Securities, demanding that the brokerage house compensate him for the assets siphoned from his Mirae Asset account.
Shortly after Bae was taken into custody in October 2023 on charges of stock price manipulation linked to the internet giant’s acquisition of SM Entertainment, a group of hackers breached his account and attempted to withdraw assets worth 7.66 billion won by selling all of its stock holdings.
With Mirae Asset’s daily withdrawal cap limiting the amount, the group attempted to liquidate the assets by transferring some of the equity holdings to Samsung Securities. Samsung Securities, however, froze the account as its system flagged the attempted transaction as suspicious, preventing the loss of assets worth 6.08 billion won.
The remaining 1.58 billion won could not be recovered after it was transferred by the hackers to Bae's accounts at other financial institutions and then withdrawn or transferred to overseas cryptocurrency exchanges.
Bae has been claiming Mirae Asset should cover the loss, citing the Electronic Financial Transactions Act, which states when a user suffers any loss due to forgery or alteration of the means of access, the relevant financial company can be held liable for indemnifying the loss.
He further argued that the damages should be calculated based on the current market value of his equity holdings, which would add up to roughly 11 billion won.
Meanwhile, Mirae Asset has argued that its liability is limited, as the company has maintained an identity verification system as mandated by the government and further said that any compensation should be assessed based on the actual loss of 1.58 billion won.
"The final outflow of Bae's assets happened through other financial institutions," the company stated. "It is practically impossible for the court to acknowledge the argument based on current market value.”
silverstar@heraldcorp.com
