Legal Issues and the Balancing of Interests in Pseudonymized Information

This study examines the legislative background and framework of the pseudonymized information regime introduced into the Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) and the Credit Information Act by the 2020 amendments to the “Data 3 Acts,” focusing on recent court judgments and the Constitutional Court’s decision. The regime permits pseudonymization and use of personal data without consent for limited purposes such as statistics, research, and public interest records, but has raised disputes over its legal nature, the scope of control rights, the breadth of permissible purposes, and the adequacy of safeguards. Lower courts held that pseudonymization constitutes “processing of personal information” subject to the right to request suspension, whereas the Supreme Court viewed it as a technical safeguard excluded from such rights. The Constitutional Court recognized a restriction on the right to informational self-determination but upheld the provisions as proportionate in light of legislative purpose and protective measures. This study argues that these interpretations overlook the incompleteness of pseudonymization, the broad scope of purposes, and the role of data subjects, and proposes strengthening safeguards, clarifying purposes, and ensuring fair value-sharing. It calls for future legislation and interpretation to move beyond the regulation-promotion dichotomy toward a multidimensional balancing approach suited to the data- driven economy.