Korea enters the AI cinema era with copyright questions unresolved

Generative AI is bringing films closer to live-action quality, but Korea still lacks clear rules to protect copyright, likeness rights and creators as the technology advances.

The growing realism of AI-generated films has also raised concerns that human actors could eventually lose work to digital characters.

"As a rookie short-film director, I was thrilled because I thought I could cut production costs. As an actor, though, I was very sad. I wondered if I should retire," actor and director Lee Jung-hyun, who served as a judge at an AI film competition on Oct. 18 said.

The rapid advance of generative AI has opened the door to what some in the industry describe as the beginning of an “AI cinema” era.

But critics say Korea has yet to build a sufficient institutional framework for copyright, likeness rights and creator protection.

One industry account described a user who asked a Chinese AI video model for a Korean noir-style alley scene got a video showing the face of a recognizable Korean actor.

Current Korean rules offer no way to regulate such cases.

The European Union has put legal safeguards against unauthorized AI training into law. In the United States, lawsuits have continued against global Big Tech companies over alleged rights violations.

Many in the industry say Korea urgently needs to discuss legitimate AI training rights and a compensation system for rights holders.

“Technology is evolving so quickly that we need to establish rules as soon as possible on what we should be careful about and what kinds of [image-based creative] assets can be opened for public use,” Kim Young-deok, director of Busan International Film Festival’s Asian Contents & Film Market, said. “But the legal debate is moving too slowly.”

“Korea is in a blind spot the law hasn’t caught up with, where generative AI can be used without permission,” said director Min Kyu-dong, head of the Directors Guild of Korea. “For creators, it’s paradise. But an era of complicated legal battles over rights is just around the corner.”

Min said the industry has reached a point where it must make a choice.

“Big Tech companies are trying to persuade intellectual property [IP] owners to allow training in exchange for a one-time licensing fee,” Min said. “But others argue that once copyrighted work is used for training, AI could exploit it indefinitely, so a one-time payment is not enough.”

The Korea Copyright Commission announced last year that video content created with generative AI can receive copyright protection if sufficient human creative contribution is recognized.

For example, director Kwon Han-sl’s AI short film “One More Pumpkin” (2024) has been officially registered as a work created with AI assistance.

Clear standards are still lacking, however, when AI-generated content infringes on someone else’s rights.

Director Kim Sung-soo, known for “12.12: The Day” (2023), is currently producing the AI short film “Worm Train.” 

“I run every AI-generated character through Google because I worry there might be someone who looks similar,” Kim said.

Public debate over AI-generated video has become far more active in some countries.

Chinese AI video generation model Seedance, developed by ByteDance, sparked strong backlash in Hollywood in February after it generated highly realistic composite action videos featuring real Hollywood stars.

Since then, most generative video AI programs have blocked requests naming a real person to generate a lookalike, as well as uploads of real photographs.

Japan has also moved to address unauthorized AI-generated voices.

Its actor and voice actor groups issued guidelines on Oct. 15 to protect voice rights after repeated cases in which celebrity voices were generated without permission.

Korea has faced similar controversy this year.

AI videos that allegedly used the likenesses and voices of actors such as Yeom Hye-ran and Don Lee without permission appeared on YouTube.

But the controversy has yet to result in broader social safeguards.

Korea also lacks a homegrown generative video AI model that can compete with leading foreign systems.

“Domestic AI technology is relatively behind in content generation. Copyright issues are much more difficult to resolve when it comes to video content,” said Ha Jung-woo, standing vice chair of the National AI Strategy Committee, at a screening last month of “Steelay,” a feature film made entirely with AI.

Ha also noted the need for a national strategy.

Many in the film industry say Korea is unlikely to catch up with China’s AI video technology in the immediate future.

For that reason, the film industry sees a more realistic immediate task: Korea needs a transparent and rigorous system that can verify whether other people’s creative works or likenesses were used to train AI without permission during production.

The ability to produce content that can circulate globally without triggering rights disputes could become a key source of competitiveness in the AI video era.

“Once AI films move beyond the experimental stage and become commercial products, a ‘trust guarantee’ that shows the content was not created through unauthorized use will become an asset as important as the IP itself,” said Jang Hoon, CEO of production company Creative Mango.

The company is developing AI films with directors including Kim Sung-soo and Lee Myung-se.

“In an era when AI technology allows anyone anywhere in the world to imitate K-content, Korea needs to distinguish itself through ‘clean content’ that is free of copyright disputes,” Jang said.

BY NA WON-JEONG [[email protected]]