US-based Amazon of South Korea forced to recover laptop from bottom of Chinese river in bizarre data privacy clampdown: report | Latest Tech News
South Korea’s authorities allegedly forced a US web retailer to perform a bizarre and dangerous plot to recover a stolen laptop from the bottom of a river in China – half of a high-level data-privacy clampdown that US officers declare is the latest instance of the nation’s anti-American tech rules run amok.
A House Judiciary Committee report launched on Wednesday detailed how Seattle-based Coupang – recognized as the “Amazon of South Korea” where it does 90% of its business – believed it had no selection but to rent scuba divers for the James Bond-style caper as top South Korean regulators pressed for an elaborate probe of a November data breach that affected 33 million clients.
Coupang launched a photograph of the destroyed MacBook Air laptop that was recovered from a river in China by a dive workforce deployed by the US tech company. Coupang
Indeed, while South Korea’s National Intelligence Service denied any involvement, Coupang compiled a host of evidence to the opposite — including messages from a senior authorities aide affirming that South Korea’s president had been briefed on the operation.
The “highest levels of the South Korean government, including President Lee Jae-myung himself, knew that the NIS had been closely instructing Coupang on the recovery operation and that Coupang acted in response to these directives,” the report said.
Coupang confronted 40 investigations from 11 different South Korean companies, threats of journey bans for its executives and potential fines of up to 10% of its global income, the report said. On June 11, South Korea’s Personal Information Protection Commission fined Coupang $410 million — practically twice its revenue last yr — after discovering that the company had illegally harvested buyer data.
The December mission centered on a rogue Coupang worker, a Chinese national who had allegedly extracted the personal data of 3,000 clients — a tiny fraction of the 33 million who had been caught in a huge data breach at the company reported on Nov. 27 – and fled to Shanghai, according to the report.
Coupang contacted the rogue worker, who confessed and agreed to flip over a number of devices linked to the theft – besides for a laptop he had tossed into a Shanghai river in a panic, according to the 35-page report, a copy of which was obtained by The Post.
South Korea’s NIS allegedly told Coupang that its brokers couldn’t personally retrieve the devices because Chinese law bars international intelligence companies from working on its soil. Instead, it ordered Coupang to ship one of its own staff to acquire the devices and the rogue worker’s fingerprints – all under the Chinese authorities’s nostril.
A photograph of the Shanghai river where a rogue Coupang worker threw a laptop tied to the data breach. Coupang
A Coupang rep traveled to Shanghai on Dec. 17 to meet with the suspect and his lawyer, who handed over a desktop PC, 4 exhausting drives and copies, a graphics card and a signed confession. But the next day, the NIS told Coupang it was still required to recover the lacking laptop.
Coupang complied — hiring a scuba diving workforce to fish the machine out of the dirty water, according to the report.
All of the recovered supplies, including the devices, the worker’s confession and fingerprints, had been submitted to a ready NIS official, who introduced them to the close by Korean consulate in Shanghai. The Coupang worker was told to confirm there have been “no CCTV cameras to capture the handoff,” according to a doc cited in the report.
After the “dangerous recovery operation” was deemed a success, South Korea and its National Intelligence Service surprised Coupang officers by denying any participation, according to the report to the House Judiciary Committee, which is chaired by Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).
The House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Rep. Jim Jordan, spearheaded the probe. AFP via Getty Images
Coupang’s interim CEO Harold Rogers told House Judiciary officers that he “never would’ve authorized an employee to go to China” or “authorized hiring a diving crew in broad daylight in China to retrieve a device unless [he] firmly believed that [Coupang] had a legal obligation and a requirement to do so,” the report said.
Other evidence included a signed letter from an NIS dated Dec. 2 confirming that Coupang had a legal obligation to comply with its orders. Between Dec. 1 and Dec. 26, the NIS exchanged more than 230 telephone calls with Coupang associated to its investigation into the data breach and also held a number of in-person conferences with the company about the recovery plan, the report added.
The stress marketing campaign got here to a head at the end of December, when Coupang’s Rogers was grilled during two days of hearings by South Korea’s National Assembly.
When Rogers testified that Coupang had adopted “this agency’s instructions” about containing the data breach, referring to the NIS, the federal government responded by threatening legal perjury fees against him, as nicely as a potential journey ban. Those fees are still pending.
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung addresses a ceremony at Suwon Convention Center in Suwon, South Korea, 25 June 2026. YONHAP/EPA/Shutterstock
The NIS explicitly denied Coupang’s claims in a press release on Dec. 26 and again on Dec. 30, declaring they had been “completely false.”
“This is directly contradicted by documents and testimony obtained by the Committee,” the House Judiciary report said.
The Coupang operation was half of an effort to hamstring US tech companies that South Korea fears are a risk to homegrown rivals, according to the report. Google’s Maps service is presently banned in the nation, while OpenAI, Meta, Apple and Netflix have all confronted investigations from South Korean regulators.
“South Korea has weaponized digital laws and regulations to hinder the ability of innovative American companies to effectively compete in its market,” added the report, which in contrast the nation’s regulatory techniques to those employed by Europe against the US tech industry.
Coupang in specific has been a repeated goal for top South Korean officers, famous Kate Kalutkiewicz, who served as senior director of commerce coverage at the National Economic Council during President Trump’s first time period in workplace.
Coupang is based in Seattle but derives most of its income from South Korea. Coupang
That consists of South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, who declared on Dec. 2 that Coupang and other firms that violate data security guidelines ought to face penalties so extreme that they may exit of business.
“I think it’s a very big deal,”Kalutkiewicz said. “If we’re talking about a partner like South Korea, the fact that it is threatening criminal charges and the type of harassment and accusations being levied at executives of a of a large American company is fairly unusual, to say the least.”
Korea’s SK Telecom was fined just $97 million for a breach that uncovered about 27 million clients including delicate consumer data, while another firm, Kakao, was fined $11 million for a breach that uncovered about 40 million accounts.
Coupang has said cybersecurity consultants who reviewed the breach said it was minor in nature and didn’t outcome in hurt to clients.
“We regret the circumstances that led to the House Judiciary Committee’s investigation and we remain committed to finding a constructive resolution so Coupang can once again serve as a bridge to strengthen the US-Korea alliance, accelerating trade and investment that benefits both countries,” a Coupang Inc. spokesperson said in a assertion.
Coupang’s interim CEO Harold Rogers was threatened with a journey ban and perjury fees. Getty Images for Semafor World Economy
Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned on June 2 that US firms are dealing with “targeting in South Korea” which had “frankly impacted our ability to conclude a trade agreement with them.” Coupang, which was based by Harvard-educated Korean American Bom Kim, claims to be the poster baby for that mistreatment.
Aside from top Trump administration officers like Vice President JD Vance, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have rallied to Coupang’s protection, including more than 50 Republicans who ripped South Korea’s regulatory techniques in a fiery April letter.
Demetrios Marantis, a former appearing US Trade Representative, described the South Korean authorities’s treatment of Coupang as “by far the worst that I’ve ever seen in 30-plus years.”
“There is a whole-of-government assault on a US company in a way that is so disproportionate to how the Korean government has treated Korean and Chinese companies who have been in similar situations,” Marantis said.
South Korean authorities officers didn’t immediately return requests for remark.
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