The law layer · Republic of Korea · national AI statute
South Korea: the AI Framework Act
Framework Act on the Development of Artificial Intelligence and Establishment of Trust, the “AI Basic Act” · in force with its Enforcement Decree on 22 January 2026
Page verified 5 August 2026. Recorded from official summaries, the published English translation of the Act and contemporaneous legal analysis. We have not read the Enforcement Decree.
The second comprehensive AI law in the world, and the first in Asia. It matters here for a narrow reason: alongside the EU and China, Korea has now put labelling of generative AI output into primary legislation. Three of the largest economies in the world, three different legal traditions, same requirement.
What it does
- Two purposesThe Act is explicitly a development statute as well as a trust statute. Its full title is the Framework Act on the Development of Artificial Intelligence and Establishment of Trust.
- High-impact AISpecific obligations attach to AI in critical sectors, named as including healthcare, energy and public services.
- LabellingMandatory labelling requirements for certain applications of generative AI.
- BaselineGeneral obligations for trust, safety, transparency and user protection across the board.
The pattern it completes
Set the three comprehensive regimes side by side and the convergence is hard to miss:
- EUAI Act Article 50. Machine-readable marking of synthetic content, applicable 2 August 2026.
- ChinaLabelling Measures. Explicit and implicit labels, in force 1 September 2025.
- KoreaAI Basic Act. Mandatory labelling for certain generative AI, in force 22 January 2026.
Three legislatures with very different attitudes to regulation arrived independently at the same conclusion within eleven months of each other. That is what a durable requirement looks like as it forms, and it is a stronger signal than any single statute.
Honest limits on this page
We have not read the Enforcement Decree, which is where thresholds, the domestic-representative rule and the detail of the labelling duty actually live. This page therefore carries no article numbers and no thresholds. Anyone with a Korean exposure should have the Act and the Decree read properly before acting on a summary, including this one.
What to do about it
This is an estate problem, not a document problem.
High-impact AI in healthcare, energy or public services is judged on what the system actually did on a given day, not on what the framework said it would do. Regulayer records the decision as it is taken, outside the system being governed, content-free, and verifiable by anyone holding the file with public mathematics, without a call to us.
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Sources
- Framework Act on the Development of Artificial Intelligence and Establishment of Trust, English translation, Center for Security and Emerging Technology
- Effective date confirmed across official and professional sources as 22 January 2026, together with the Enforcement Decree.
- Enforcement Decree not read. No thresholds or article numbers are given on this page.
Related
- The law layer
- South Korea · PIPA
- China · AI content labelling
- AI rules for lawyers, country by country
Checked 5 August 2026. Information, not legal advice, and not advice on Korean law.
Common questions
When did South Korea's AI law take effect?
The AI Basic Act and its Enforcement Decree took effect on 22 January 2026, making South Korea the second jurisdiction after the European Union with a comprehensive AI regulatory regime, and the first in Asia.
What does the Korean AI Basic Act require?
It combines industrial promotion with baseline obligations for trust, safety, transparency and user protection. It creates specific duties for 'high-impact' AI systems in critical sectors such as healthcare, energy and public services, and imposes mandatory labelling requirements for certain applications of generative AI.
Does the Korean AI Act apply to foreign companies?
It is drafted to reach AI activity affecting the Korean market, and foreign providers above certain thresholds have obligations including, in some cases, appointing a domestic representative. Anyone relying on that summary should read the Act and its Enforcement Decree before acting, and we say so rather than state a threshold we have not verified.
How does Korea's law compare with the EU AI Act?
Both are comprehensive and risk-tiered, but Korea's frames itself around promoting development as well as establishing trust, and its 'high-impact' category is drawn by sector rather than by the EU's longer annexed list of high-risk use cases. Korea's regime became applicable on 22 January 2026; the EU AI Act became generally applicable on 2 August 2026.
Information, not legal advice, and not advice on the law of any jurisdiction. Every entry is verified against the issuing body’s own document; where a source is reporting rather than the document, we say so.