​The government plans to provide legal services to prevent technology extortion from small and medium-sized enterprises(SMEs) with technological competitiveness.

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups on Monday signed an agreement with the Seoul and Daejeon Bar Associations and the Korea Patent Attorney Association on operating a legal support team on technological protection for SMEs.

The support team consisting of 90 lawyers and patent attorneys will select 60 small and medium firms that are especially vulnerable to defending their technologies.

The team will assist the firms in various legal activities aimed at preventing unfair trade practices such as large firms extorting technologies of small companies.

The chosen SMEs will be educated on how to respond to requests of technical data during their business transactions with large firms.

The legal team will also help in areas of reviewing written contracts and attending meetings when contracts are drawn up.