Prime Minister nominee Han Seong-sook on the 22nd addressed the personal data leak that occurred in the government's startup support program "Startup for All," saying, "As the Minister of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, I feel a heavy responsibility and am deeply sorry."
Han, arriving for work that day at the Financial Supervisory Service training center in Tongui-dong, Seoul, said, "I sincerely apologize to all users who experienced worry and inconvenience due to the personal data leak on the Startup for All platform," and stated accordingly.
Han said, "As soon as we recognized the incident, we implemented emergency security measures, including blocking external access," adding, "We are currently investigating the cause of the incident, the path of the leak, and the scope of the damage with the relevant agencies, and we will also proceed in parallel with security diagnostics and the preparation of improvement measures in cooperation with external security experts."
Han said, "We will put the protection of affected users first and promptly implement the necessary steps to prevent any further damage," adding, "We will also prepare measures to ensure challengers' ideas are safely protected."
Han also said she would review the concerns raised in advance and the overall system development and operation process. Han said, "We will thoroughly verify whether the necessary steps were taken in a timely manner and whether there were shortcomings in oversight," adding, "We will strengthen supervision of external contractors and inspections for security vulnerabilities to ensure similar cases do not recur." Han added, "We will disclose the investigation results transparently and take strict action regarding wrongdoing and responsibility."
Earlier, at Startup for All, a personal data leak occurred, and it was confirmed that participants' startup ideas and review comments were exposed. (☞[Exclusive] "Startup for All" first cohort's 5,000 passers' ideas and review comments leaked) The Korea Institute of Startup and Entrepreneurship Development (KISED), which oversees the project, notified all 5,000 first-cohort passers of the leak on the 18th.
The leaked information includes email addresses, business ideas, and review comments, and the leak is estimated to have occurred on the 15th. The Korea Institute of Startup and Entrepreneurship Development (KISED) said it identified indications that some IPs accessed nonpublic information and blocked external access, but the specific intrusion route has not yet been determined.