Opposition lawmaker questioned over gov't document leak allegation

Rep. Shim Jae-cheol speaks to the press upon his arrival at the Seoul Central District Court in Seoul, Thursday. /Yohnap

By Kim Jae-heun

The prosecution summoned Rep. Shim Jae-cheol of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party, Thursday, to question him over an allegation that he and his aides leaked budget-related government data without authorization.

The questioning comes three months after the controversy emerged and the Ministry of Economy and Finance filed a complaint against Shim's three aides for violating the Information Communications Network Act and Electronic Government Act on Sept. 17. It was the first time the ministry has filed a complaint against an incumbent lawmaker.

“The national budget is precious tax money paid by the people. I've been ordered by the people and been given a right by the people to monitor the government, and revealed their wrongful use of the budget,” Shim said upon his arrival at the Seoul Central District Court.

“However, the government and the ruling party are trying to muzzle me by falsely accusing me of divulging state secrets.”

In addition, Shim emphasized that his aides did not use any illegal means to access the government materials. He also criticized the prosecution for raiding his offices and looking into his phone records as well as those of his family and aides.

Prosecutors suspect that Shim had browsed over 1 million pages of undisclosed documents related to the ministry's finance plan. They questioned him over whether he ordered his staffers to download the unapproved information and if he knew that it was an illegal act to leak such material.

The ministry argued that Shim's aides accessed the government's finance information analyzing system over 190 times using illegal methods, and garnered over a million unauthorized administrative files owned by 30 different government bodies including the Presidential Secretariat, Office of the Prime Minister and the Supreme Court.

Shim has limited access to the system but the aides downloaded materials that were not permitted for lawmakers to access.

The lawmaker has been disputing the allegation, adding they did not use any illegal methods like hacking but gained access accidentally when they pressed the backspace key several times. Shim also demonstrated how he had reached the system during a National Assembly session.

Still, the finance ministry claims it was impossible for only a few clicks of the backspace key to have led them to the government's unauthorized information, which requires sophisticated computing techniques like hacking.

The ministry further argued that even if the lawmaker reached to the system accidentally, it is illegal to download the materials continuously while knowing that they contain unauthorized information.

With the data, Shim accused Cheong Wa Dae of improper use of 240 million won of national budget. He claimed that some presidential office staffers used the money at bars over the weekends.

Prosecutors have not questioned him until recently because the National Assembly's regular sessions were ongoing. As the sessions finished, the prosecution is expected to speed up the investigation and decide soon whether to indict the lawmaker.