Korea Criminal Act(KCA) Art. 315(Interference with Auction or Bidding) reads as follows: “A person who interferes with the impartial conduct of an auction or a bid through fraudulent means or by the threat of force or by other means, shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than two years or by a fine not exceeding seven million won.” So when a person(or a bidder) unlawfully manipulates computer programs of the agency calling for bids in order to obtain information about a minimum bidding price so that he can win the contract for sure. In the present case handed down by the Suprem Court of Korea, the defendants(bidder and manipulators) are found not guilty of Fraud by Use of Computer, etc(Art. 347-2 KCA) because a directness between a data processing and a property taking. The present paper agrees with the opinion of the Court, and moreover denies the violation of Fraud(Art. 347 KCA) in that the conduct does not make pecuniary loss to the agency. A bid-rigging is punishable by the Art. 315, and a violation of the Korean Anti-monopoly law and Construction law as well.

In this article, we analyze the decision of the Supreme Court in Korea with respect to the unauthorized modification of information and the immediacy of property disposal in a computer fraud critically. In the mentioned case, the defendant was charged with unlawful behavior to change the information by installing a hacking program on electronic bidding system of an administrative office. The author evaluated the defendant‘s conduct at issue not as an unauthorized change of information, but as an input of false information or illegal command input for computer. In terms of the immediacy of property disposal, this paper contends that we can’t say that computer fraud doesn’t hold, without exception, if a person involved in the property disposal process. In order to determine whether the computer fraud is established, we have to analyze the contents of the involved individual’s action in detail.

The defendant in this case withdrew 50,000 Won from a cash dispenser by using a cash card given by the card owner, who asked the defendant to withdraw 20,000 Won. The defendant gave 20,000 Won to the card owner, but took 30,000 Won for himself. The prosecutor accused the defendant of committing "fraud by using a computer" in Article 347-1 of the Penal Code, but the trial court held him not guilty in that the object of "fraud by using a computer" was limited to "property interest" different from "property." Appealing to the higher court, the prosecutor accused the defendant of committing "theft" in Article 329 of the Penal Code. However, the appeal court held him not guilty in that a cash dispenser was supposed to give cash to a cash card user if provided with a correct password; the bank, the occupier of the cash dispenser, could not be considered to have an intention of giving cash to a card user after reviewing the scope of the entrust between the card owner and the card user; therefore, the defendant did not withdraw cash against the intention of the bank. After reviewing the case, the Supreme Court held the defendant committed "fraud by using a computer" in Article 347-1 of the Penal Code, providing when the defendant withdrew 50,000 Won, he did not commit "theft" while he acquired "property interest," which is 20,000 Won. This article reviews legal dogmatic issues of this case. First, it compares this new decision by the Supreme Court with its previous decisions where it held the defendant committed "theft" in that he withdrew cash from a cash dispenser by using a cash card without any entrust from the card owner. Second, it analyzes two important aspects of the case: whether the defendant in this case withdrew cash against the intention of the bank or not; why 20,000 Won in this case should be interpreted as "property interest," not "property."