The defendant, who worked at the South Korean semiconductor supplier since 2013, began her career in chip defect analysis and later rose to become a team leader in business-to-business customer relations.

Just before resigning, she printed reams of confidential information and smuggled the papers out of the building in shifts, using her rucksack and a collection of shopping bags.

The unnamed defendant claimed the documents were printed for study purposes and to aid in the transition before taking up a new position at Huawei.

Huawei, a company long scrutinised for its alleged ties to the Chinese government and associated cybersecurity concerns, now finds itself indirectly linked to this scandal.

The stolen documents reportedly contained "solutions to semiconductor manufacturing process issues", and the printing method used was an attempt to bypass a ban on USB drives and external storage devices at SK Hynix facilities.

SK Hynix is also said to closely monitor printed material, although the Shanghai facility was noted by the court for having less rigorous security than the company's other offices.

The ex-employee was sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined the equivalent of $14,300. While she was found guilty of breaching the South Korea's Industrial Technology Protection Act, the prosecutors failed to prove that Huawei received the stolen information, and SK Hynix did not report specific financial damage from the incident, resulting in a somewhat lighter sentence.