An advertisement in Times Square, New York for a company that informs others of the history and culture of a country has become a hot topic. That is small Korean fashion brand, Lakai Korea. Currently, Korea is suffering from controversy over China's Northeast Project and Japan's territorial dispute over Dokdo. Thus, as a representative company of Korea, they decided to inform the world about the history and culture of Korea. On the occasion of Independence Movement Day, they succeeded in clearly delivering a message to the world by emphasizing that the traditional Korean clothes, hanbok, and kimchi are ours. They began to receive a great deal of attention from the media.
The reaction of China after seeing the advertisement was very intense. Since the Chinese government has been carrying out the Northeast Project claiming that Korean traditional culture and history are actually China’s, they were sensitive to this advertisement. Chinese people are expressing criticism and dissatisfaction by saying they will not buy the company's products. However, Lakai Korea said that it is natural to announce that what is Korea’s is, in fact, Korea’s and subsequently decided not to sell their products in China.
The same goes for Japan. This is because the advertisement posted on Independence Movement Day also contains a message about the Japanese colonial era. It started ‘WE HAD ONLY ONE DREAM. WHAT IS YOUR DREAM?’ emphasizing the fact that 'our dream was to be independent'. Lakai Korea became the target of boycott in Japan because of this, prompting Lakai to state, “Japan is just one of 239 countries we sell in and we simply tell the truth.”
Since then, criticism from China and Japan has grown stronger and the continuous distortion of history has reached an unbearable level. As a result, Lakai Korea said they plan to proceed with an international lawsuit. After spending four months preparing for the lawsuit, the company finally signed a contract with a famous American law firm, bringing the topic to the forefront once again.
This US law firm, Lewis & Lin, is based in New York and has a winning record over numerous cases. Their primary work focuses on defamation and the core legal requirements for clients in the Internet and Technology industries. It is a law firm with a sophisticated Internet presence and extensive knowledge of legal issues affecting the Internet service industry. They focus on domain name law, trademark and trade dress, copyright, technology licensing, and small business services. They often represent Internet customers with unresolved issues for products and services offered online.
They recently filed a suit against a psychiatrist with a private practice in Manhattan regarding false and fabricated online statements. Beginning with a consent order for a preliminary injunction requiring the removal of defamatory blog posts, they managed to obtain orders to delete defamatory blogs at an incredibly fast pace in just four days.
There is another international case in which they restored the domain name that was stolen by a Chinese hacker. Using multiple proxy servers to hide the hacker's real IP address, location, and identity, the Chinese hacker transferred the plaintiff's account to his eNOM account after accessing it. After Lewis & Lin filed a lawsuit in the US District Court, they requested the defendant for return by email after approval from the court. When the defendant did not respond, the court declared default on the defendant and ruled, and declared that the plaintiff is the rightful owner of the domain name.
In Korea, there are not many cases where international litigation has been filed like this. International litigation against overseas netizens is mainly litigation related to intellectual property rights infringement. Defamation lawsuit cases are relatively few. The reason is that, unlike intellectual property litigation, defamation litigation does not bring much benefit considering the legal costs.
However, as this company is trying to file an international lawsuit at a large cost while facing a loss, it is receiving tremendous applause and support from Koreans as well as other countries.
Through earnest intentions, they announced a good starting point by working with a well-known American law firm. People around the world have high expectations, so I hope that the current process will continue and bring positive results.