Key facts
- The Seoul Administrative Court suspended execution of the 201.1 billion-won fine until 30 days after the first verdict in Coupang's main lawsuit.
- The privacy regulator penalized Coupang over collection of online activity records of about 11.17 million users without consent.
- A separate 423.6 billion-won fine over a data breach affecting more than 37 million users was not suspended; a different court panel rejected that request.
A Seoul court on Friday temporarily suspended a 201.1 billion-won (US$147.74 million) fine imposed on e-commerce company Coupang Corp. over unauthorized collection of user data, officials said, according to a Yonhap report published November 6.
The Personal Information Protection Commission levied the penalty surcharges after Coupang collected the online activity records of about 11.17 million users and stored them in its database without consent. Coupang filed a lawsuit seeking to cancel the surcharges and separately sought an injunction against the fine.
The Seoul Administrative Court granted the injunction request on Friday and suspended execution of the fine until 30 days after the first verdict in the main lawsuit, citing concern the penalty could cause irrecoverable damage to the company.
Separately, the commission had fined Coupang 423.6 billion won over a data breach affecting more than 37 million users, which Yonhap described as the largest fine ever handed down by the privacy regulator to a single firm. Coupang filed an injunction request to suspend that fine, but a different panel of the court rejected the request on Thursday.