Policy Briefing — South Korea PIPC Issues AI Personal Information Guidelines

Executive briefing: The Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC) of South Korea released the Guidelines on Personal Information Processing for Artificial Intelligence Services on 16 May 2024. The guidance applies to developers and operators of AI systems, reinforcing obligations for lawful processing, human oversight, and safeguards against algorithmic discrimination.

Key obligations

Transparency. AI providers must publish clear notices explaining data collection, training datasets, model purpose, and avenues for user inquiries.
Data minimisation and quality. Controllers should collect only necessary data, verify dataset accuracy, and document preprocessing steps to prevent bias.
Risk assessments. Organisations must evaluate privacy and discrimination risks before deployment, documenting mitigation and monitoring measures.
Human oversight. High-impact AI decisions require human review options, escalation channels, and audit trails.
Incident response. Providers must establish procedures for personal data breaches or algorithmic malfunctions, including reporting obligations under the Personal Information Protection Act.

Implementation guidance

Lifecycle governance. The guidelines emphasise governance from design to retirement, with checkpoints for training, validation, deployment, and monitoring.
Third-party management. Contracts with AI vendors must address data processing instructions, security measures, and audit rights.
Children and sensitive data. Enhanced safeguards apply when processing minors’ data or sensitive attributes, including explicit consent and additional logging.

Program actions

Policy alignment. Update privacy policies, consent language, and AI service descriptions to reflect transparency expectations.
Risk and bias documentation. Create assessment templates capturing dataset lineage, evaluation metrics, and fairness testing results.
Monitoring dashboards. Deploy monitoring for drift, anomalous behaviour, and user complaints, linked to incident escalation workflows.
Vendor oversight. Incorporate PIPC requirements into procurement checklists and ongoing vendor reviews.

Sources

Zeph Tech operationalises South Korea’s AI privacy guidelines by pairing lifecycle governance tooling with fairness testing and incident readiness.