Coupang Stock Rises Premarket: ‘Amazon Of Asia’ Faces South Korea Probe Over Massive Data Breach

A data breach compromising more than 33 million user records has put Coupang in the crosshairs of regulators and investors.

• The company encountered a data breach last year, with personal data of more than 33 million customers leaked.
• Coupang on Thursday said that an additional 165,000 accounts were also part of the leak.
• CEO Park Dae-jun resigned in December after the data breach that sparked widespread concern.

Coupang Inc.’s stock rose 0.3% premarket on Tuesday following two consecutive sessions of gains, but investors and retail traders are seeking more details after South Korean authorities reportedly asked the “Amazon of Asia” to address vulnerabilities in its security systems.

The company encountered a data breach last year, with personal data of more than 33 million customers leaked. Coupang became aware of the data breach in November and reported it during the same month.

The South Korean government has been investigating the data breach, which is among the worst in the country so far, and reportedly identified on Tuesday that the leak was caused by a former Coupang engineer.

Shares of Coupang are heading for a fourth straight month of decline. The stock has traded lower since the data breach was made public in November and has declined more than 21% so far this year.

The Data Breach

Coupang on Thursday said that an additional 165,000 accounts were also part of the leak. According to the South Korean news agency Yonhap, the ministry said that the joint probe analyzed 25.6 terabytes of web access logs, which showed that 33.67 million users' names and email addresses were leaked.

The report noted that the science ministry said it plans to impose fines on Coupang for reporting about the breach late. Yonhap noted that the ministry observed that Coupang became aware of the breach at 4 p.m. on Nov. 17 but did not report it to authorities until 9:35 p.m. on Nov. 19, well beyond the 24-hour reporting requirement.

In December, Coupang announced plans to implement a 1.685 trillion won customer compensation program to restore customer trust. Coupang planned to distribute purchase vouchers worth around 1.685 trillion won to customers starting Jan. 15 this year.

CEO Park Dae-jun resigned in December after the data breach that sparked widespread concern, and Dae-jun took responsibility for the outbreak and the subsequent recovery process. Coupang named the company’s Chief Administrative Officer and General Counsel, Harold Rogers, as interim CEO. The interim CEO was questioned last week regarding details on the data breach.

How Are Stocktwits Users’ Reacting?

Retail sentiment on Coupang jumped to ‘bullish’ from ‘neutral’ a day ago, with message volumes at ‘high’ levels, according to data from Stocktwits. In the last 24 hours, retail message volumes on the platform jumped 67%.

Shares of Coupang have lost nearly 22% of their value in the last 12 months.

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