Hacking Attempts Against South Korea’s Court Network Surge to Nearly 240,000

South Korea’s court network faced nearly 240,000 hacking attempts during the first eight months of 2026, a sharp increase that has renewed scrutiny of cybersecurity protections for the country’s judicial system.

Data from the National Court Administration showed that its security information and event management system detected 239,145 attempts between January and August. The figure was about 1.7 times the 141,528 attempts recorded during all of 2025 and roughly 2.4 times the 101,205 detected in the same eight-month period last year.

The data were provided to Democratic Party lawmaker Kim Dong-a, a member of the National Assembly’s Legislation and Judiciary Committee. The figures indicate that attempted intrusions are occurring at a markedly faster pace than in previous years, although the report did not say that every detected attempt resulted in a breach.

March recorded the highest monthly total at 48,263 attempts. May followed with 39,915, while June had 34,083 and August registered 30,576. With the exception of January, every month through August exceeded 20,000 attempts. In earlier years, monthly totals were generally below that threshold.

The rise is significant because South Korea’s courts hold extensive stores of sensitive information connected to legal proceedings, litigants and court administration. The latest numbers measure suspected attempts flagged by the judiciary’s monitoring system rather than confirmed compromises, but they highlight the growing volume of hostile or suspicious activity that security teams must assess.

Annual figures had previously remained around 100,000. The court system recorded 142,514 hacking attempts in 2021, 126,212 in 2022, 114,070 in 2023 and 98,171 in 2024. The 2026 tally through August alone was therefore more than double the full-year count in 2024.

The judiciary has also dealt with a confirmed data exposure in the recent past. A hacking incident spanning from June 2021 to January 2023 resulted in the disclosure of personal information belonging to about 18,000 people. A subsequent internal audit led to a departmental warning for the National Court Administration’s information security office. Five officials received stern cautions, three were cleared without disciplinary action, and two former officials could not be sanctioned because they had already left their posts.

The accelerating volume of detected attempts is likely to add pressure for stronger preventive controls, faster incident response and closer legislative oversight of the digital systems supporting South Korea’s courts.