고용계약 종료 후 사용자의 영업비밀 보호와 근로자의 직업선택의 자유의 법익균형

초록

It seems that precedents have recently tended to be strictly interpreted on issues surrounding the obligation to maintain confidentiality or the obligation to seize competition in Korea. In particular, it is noteworthy that the number of precedents that judge competition avoidance obligations as strict requirements has recently been on the rise. In the background of this, I think that this reflects the fact that the number of non-regular workers in Korea's job market has also increased significantly due to the diversification of employment types or diversification of employment types, leading to labor liquidity, and the increasing number of workers' voluntary and involuntary change of jobs or start-ups in the economic situation where the recession continues until recently. On the one hand, it seems that the Unfair Competition Prevention Act had in mind the change of "strengthening the protection of trade secrets" in mind. The Unfair Competition Prevention Act reinforced the protection of trade secrets in a form in which the requirements for 'secret management', one of the requirements for establishing trade secrets (Article 2, No. 2 of the Act), have been continuously relaxed through amendments in 2015 and in 2019. However, in preparation for the move to strengthen the protection of trade secrets following two revisions to the Unfair Competition Prevention Act's confidentiality requirements, the interpretation theory that excessively strengthens workers' competition prohibition obligations after retirement is likely to ignore the balance of legal interests in protecting employers' trade secrets and workers' freedom to choose their jobs after the employment contract ends. Therefore, it will be necessary to develop interpretation so that the Korean job market does not become a factor that hinders the job liquidity phenomenon due to diversification of employment types or job types. In order to adjust the interests of both in terms of protecting the trade secrets of employers and balancing the legal interests of workers' freedom of choice after the end of the employment contract, we believe that our court needs to focus on protecting trade secrets under the Unfair Competition Prevention Act or confidentiality obligations, and on the other hand, consider the freedom of job choice for workers after retirement. In particular, the attitude of our precedent, which directly judges the existence and extent of the user's protection interests without judging whether or not the object to be protected by the competition prohibition agreement after retirement falls under "trade secrets" in terms of legal interest balance with workers' freedom to choose their jobs after the employment contract ends, requires reconsideration.

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