The fields of “autonomous vehicles,” “electric vehicles,” and “urban air mobility” are rapidly growing sectors in the mobility industry both domestically and internationally. In response, the Korean government is increasingly easing regulations or establishing legal standards for these mobility sectors. This newsletter provides a summary of recent noteworthy developments in the mobility industry.
Key measures of these regulatory exemptions include establishing a basis for duplicate registration of foreign-registered aircraft domestically, permitting demonstration flights within urban areas for aircraft that have undergone prior safety testing, imposing accident reporting obligations on demonstration project operators, and defining essential flight procedures such as take-off and landing sites and emergency landing authorization for UAM demonstration projects.
These regulatory exemptions allow companies to register and utilize foreign-registered aircraft domestically and verify their technologies through urban demonstration flights, advancing the development of urban air mobility businesses.
On October 14, 2024, the Personal Information Protection Commission announced the release of the Guidelines for the Protection and Utilization of Personal Video Information for Mobile Video Processing Systems, designed to provide detailed application measures for the newly established provisions on mobile video processing systems (Article 25-2) under the Personal Information Protection Act.
The guidelines aim to establish specific standards for utilizing such devices in applications like AI development. Key topics include methods for indicating the fact of video recording by mobile video processing systems (e.g., multi-cameras for video collection) used in autonomous vehicles, robots, and drones, as well as measures required when personal video information is used for AI training purposes.
As with other guidelines related to the Personal Information Protection Act, this document serves as a crucial reference and standard for companies to ensure the lawful use of mobile video information processing devices for AI development purposes.
Materials Related to Secondary Batteries and Electric Vehicles
The Harmonized System of Korea (“HSK”) has been partially revised and will come into effect starting January 1 next year.
The HSK, based on the International Convention on the Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, provides the classification of goods imported and exported to and from Korea and serves as the basis for verifying various requirements during customs clearance, determining rules of origin under Free Trade Agreements (FTAs), and calculating simplified fixed duty drawbacks for small and medium-sized enterprises. Companies are required to include the appropriate classification codes for their products on customs declarations during import/export.
In this revision, new codes have been introduced for materials and parts related to secondary batteries and electric vehicles in connection with the mobility industry.
With the addition of these codes, which pertain to critical materials and components in the mobility industry, it is anticipated that the challenges companies face in determining the correct codes for customs declarations, as well as the associated risk of reporting errors, will be significantly alleviated.
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LIN has extensive experience in providing advisory and litigation services within the mobility industry, particularly in areas such as administrative regulations and patents and trade secret disputes related to motor vehicles. Our Mobility Team features attorneys and experts with a distinctive interest and passion for motor vehicles.
Should you wish to learn more about this newsletter or have any other inquiries, please do not hesitate to contact our firm’s Mobility Team:
Tae Joon Bae (tjbae@law-lin.com, 010-8237-8123)
Min Gu Kang (mgkang@law-lin.com, 010-3907-9217)
Ho Yeon Kim (hykim@law-lin.com, 02-3477-6300)
Han Joon Jung (hjjung@law-lin.com, 02-3477-8695)
Jeong Pil Oh (jpoh@law-lin.com, 02-3477-8695)
Yeonsoo (Sara) Lim (yslim@law-lin.com, 02-3477-6300).