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| Apple Korea logo./ Apple Korea homepage capture |
[아시아뉴스통신=조창용 기자] If a penalty was hit, it would be only 500 million won…Apple, FTC, victims, and consumers are’win-win’
According to the industry and the Fair Trade Commission on the 14th, Apple Korea, which was accused of “cheating” such as handing over iPhone advertisements and free repair costs to domestic mobile carriers, decided to offer a win-win support plan worth 100 billion won.
IPhone users will receive a 10% discount on repair and insurance fees, and elementary and secondary school students will receive 10 billion won worth of digital devices and content. A research and development (R&D) support center will also be established, allowing SMEs to engage in smart manufacturing. The news agency also revised the “GapJil contract” with Apple and laid the minimum foundation for doing business on par with Apple.
Why did Apple Korea, which has never been dreamed, suddenly act like this? This is because the Fair Trade Commission, which was trying to impose fines on Apple Korea, decided to accept Apple Korea’s’agreement resolution’.
The’consent resolution’ system, which is also unfamiliar with the term. Why did the Fair Trade Commission face a’controversy over care’ by adopting a consent vote without imposing a fine on Apple Korea?
Consent resolution refers to a procedure in which a business operator who has committed an unfair act before the Fair Trade Commission imposes sanctions first suggests a plan to restore the original condition or remedy damage. This system was introduced in December 2011 as one of the measures to implement the KORUS FTA. It can be viewed as a kind of consensus system.
Usually, the FTC imposes a fine (administrative sanctions) when unfair conduct is detected, and if the conduct is very serious, it also prosecutes the prosecution (criminal sanctions). If the consent vote is accepted, the accused avoids these two sanctions. Instead, a voluntary remedial measure similar to that of the FTC sanctions is proposed to help victims. The voluntary municipal administration plan also includes a win-win fund for victims and includes contract improvements. All fines are attributed to the state, but voluntary remedial measures are useful in that they can directly rescue victims.
Such consent and settlement is actually a very unfamiliar system in Korea. From the standpoint of Korea, which has introduced the German continental law system, the English-American dispute resolution system is not well suited. It is because of the perception that it is natural for those who have committed a crime to receive appropriate sanctions. It is for this reason that there is no plea bargaining system in which the prosecution lowers the sentence in return for the accused to plead guilty or testify against another person.
However, the English-American dispute resolution method is a little different. There is a perception that the agreement between the parties between the person who committed the unfair behavior and the victim is rather effective than the state intervention. It is also important to redeem the offender when illegality occurs, but on the other hand, it is also very important to eliminate the cause of the sin.