Report: Korea Charges Former Samsung Workers With Leaking Chip Tech to China
South Korean prosecutors have charged multiple former Samsung employees with leaking sensitive advanced computing technology to Chinese semiconductor company ChangXin Memory Technologies, an alleged violation of the country’s Industrial Technology Protection Act, Korean newspaper The Chosun reported Dec. 24.
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One former employee was accused of leaking Samsung’s 10-nanometer-class DRAM (dynamic random-access memory) “process information” by “transcribing it onto 12 sheets of paper when he changed jobs” to ChangXin in 2016, the report said. Other former employees helped by allegedly establishing a shell company and taking other steps to “evade detection” by law enforcement. ChangXin Memory “succeeded in mass-producing 10-nanometer-class DRAM in 2023, becoming the first in China and the fourth globally,” the report said.
Some U.S. lawmakers and policy analysts have urged the Bureau of Industry and Security to add ChangXin Memory to the Entity List (see 2505060002, 2502030031 and 2412030041).