인공지능(AI) 기반 플랫폼 거래에서의 소비자 보호 원칙에 관한 법적 연구 = A Legal Study on Consumer Protection Principles in AI-Based Platform Transactions

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

As AI-based platform transactions establish a dominant structure in the modern digital market, new forms of consumer risks are emerging, including the deepening of information asymmetry, dynamic pricing, hyper-nudging, and dark patterns. Existing consumer protection legislation focuses on ex-post remedies premised on explicit human decision-making; thus, it suffers from a regulatory lag, failing to keep pace with the development of self-learning and autonomous AI technologies.
Accordingly, to effectively regulate the AI platform transaction environment, this study urges a paradigm shift from the traditional focus on ex-post sanctions to an ‘ex-ante preventative approach’ that internalizes consumer protection values from the system design stage. To materialize this shift, this study unifies the fragmented discussions previously confined to individual legal domains and newly systematizes the ‘Six Consumer Protection Principles’—which govern overall platform transactions—into a three-tier normative hierarchy.
First, as the ‘Normative Foundation (Tier 1)’, the Privacy Protection Principle and the Algorithmic Accountability Principle are established to secure the existential basis and technological trust of AI systems. Second, in the ‘Normative Implementation (Tier 2)’ stage, which fosters a sound transaction environment upon this technological foundation, the Transaction Transparency Principle, Transaction Fairness Principle, and Transaction Security Principle are derived to prescribe the specific obligations of business operators. Finally, as the ‘Normative Purpose (Tier 3)’ to be ultimately achieved through the subordinate principles, the Consumer Choice Guarantee Principle, grounded in human autonomy, is positioned at the pinnacle.
The three-tier hierarchical analytical framework presented in this study performs a soft-law function that bridges the normative gap between the rapid pace of technological advancement and the rigidity of positive law. Ultimately, it will serve as a theoretical foundation providing legislative direction for the future enactment and amendment of AI-related legal frameworks.