BOK develops independent generative AI platform with Naver

(Han Joo-hyung)

The Bank of Korea (BOK) has completed its own generative artificial intelligence (AI) platform in partnership with Naver Corp., which has been promoting the value of sovereign AI through its proprietary AI model, HyperCLOVA X.

The BOK announced on Wednesday that it has completed the development of Bank of Korea Intelligence (BOKI), an AI service specialized in finance and economics, in collaboration with Naver, and has begun full-scale operations.

This project implemented a homegrown large language model (LLM)-based AI platform in an environment completely isolated from external networks to protect the security and sovereignty of core national data.

It marks the first time among central banks worldwide that generative AI has been introduced into actual operational workflows.

“In preparing for AI adoption, we standardized about 1.4 million internal documents into a format that AI can understand,” said BOK Governor Rhee Chang-yong. “Once network-separation improvements are completed in March, the scope and performance of AI utilization will be significantly enhanced.”

Naver Founder Lee Hae-jin also noted that BOKI is the first tangible result created by the BOK and Naver as “we aligned our philosophy and standards on public-sector innovation and the role of AI in the AI era.”

BOKI operates in a fully isolated, on-premises environment, fundamentally eliminating concerns over data leakage.

With BOKI, BOK employees can receive support for document search, summarization, Q&A, and translation, as well as data-driven decision-making for analyzing complex economic issues and formulating policy.