A man in his 20s who was imprisoned for creating and distributing deepfake sexual images of female teachers at his high school has been ordered to pay 17.7 million won ($12,300) in damages to one of the victims.
The Incheon District Court ruled partly in favor of the teacher, identified as A, in a damages suit seeking about 72 million won against the defendant, identified as B, 20, according to the Incheon Teachers Union on the 21st. Judge Lee Sang-eon presided over the single-judge civil division.
The court ordered B to pay A 17.7 million won in compensation.
B was indicted on charges of creating deepfake sexual images in July 2024, while still a high school student, by superimposing the faces of two female teachers at his school, as well as a senior student and an instructor at a private academy, onto nude photographs and distributing them on social media. He was also charged with using his mobile phone at school to film close-up images of parts of a victim's body.
Both teachers suffered severe psychological trauma and took extended leaves of absence, according to the union. Both have since returned to work.
Only one of the two teachers filed the civil suit. The other was unable to pursue legal action because of the severity of the psychological distress caused by the crimes, according to the union.
B was sentenced to three years in prison by an appeals court in December last year, and the sentence was later finalized.
The appellate court said the circumstances and methods of the crimes were so egregious that they amounted to what it described as the "murder of personhood" — the degradation and destruction of the victims' dignity. It noted that the teachers had suffered significant psychological harm and that recovery would be difficult because the images had been distributed through social media.
Because B had passed the age of 19 after his first trial and was no longer classified as a juvenile under the Juvenile Act, the appeals court imposed a fixed-term sentence rather than an indeterminate one.
The civil ruling recognizing liability for damages follows the finalized prison sentence in the criminal case.
The Incheon Teachers Union said the award was disappointing in size but significant nonetheless. "The amount of 17.7 million won is regrettable, but this is a ruling that sounds a social alarm in that it imposes civil liability for illegal filming and deepfake crimes targeting teachers," the union said.