South Korean Prime Minister Apologises After Data Centre Fire Halts Government Services

South Korea’s Prime Minister, Kim Min-seok, issued an apology on Saturday after a fire at a state-run data centre caused widespread disruption to hundreds of government online services, including the post office and emergency response systems.

Incident Overview

• Date and Time: Friday night
• Location: National Information Resources Service, Daejeon, approximately 150 kilometres south of Seoul
• Cause: Fire in a lithium battery
• Impact: Key state IT systems affected

The government sent multiple emergency text alerts to citizens early on Saturday, warning that:

• Some post office online services were unavailable
• 119 emergency requests could only be made via phone, not video or text

Prime Minister Kim Min-seok explained:“Because the nation’s key IT systems are concentrated in one facility, the fire suppression efforts faced considerable difficulties.”

He added: “There may be delays in processing civil applications or interruptions in the issuance of certificates, causing inconvenience in daily life. I extend my sincere apologies to the people for these inconveniences.”

According to the Interior Ministry, as of Saturday morning, 647 government online services remained suspended, including:

The blaze caused the facility’s temperature and humidity-control systems to fail, creating a risk of server overheating. As a precaution, the government temporarily shut down operations to protect its IT infrastructure.

Vice Minister Kim Min-jae told reporters: “We are currently prioritising the restoration of the temperature and humidity-control systems, after which we will restart the servers and proceed with recovery measures.”

In 2022, a fire at a KakaoTalk data centre disrupted services for over 50 million users, prompting a company apology and calls for government-led preventive measures.