Kakao co-CEO resigns after service crash

Industry

Published: 19 Oct. 2022, 11:19 Updated: 19 Oct. 2022, 14:13

Kakao co-CEO resigns after service crash

Kakao co-CEOs Namkoong Whon, left, and Hong Eun-taek bow in apology after the company’s services crashed over the weekend at a press conference held Wednesday morning at the company's office in Pangyo, Gyeonggi. [WOO SANG-JO]

Kakao co-CEO Namkoong Whon resigned on Wednesday after the company’s services crashed over the weekend when a fire broke out at a data center in Pangyo, Gyeonggi.

The co-CEO made the announcement at a press conference Wednesday at the company’s office in Pangyo, near where the blaze broke out.

"I am aware that it will take a painstaking effort to restore the trust being lost," Namkoong said, "Following the event, we will overhaul and revamp the entire Kakao system."

Namkoong and co-CEO Hong Eun-taek also issued an apology for the crash that affected a broad range of services including KakaoTalk, Kakao Pay, Kakao Bank and Kakao Games.

"This accident was a wake-up call for us to take care of the very basic value that we ought to pursue," Hong said, "Since KakaoTalk is used by the vast majority of Koreans, the service is deeply related to public interests. We will be more keen on fulfilling the responsibility."

Kakao servers were knocked out as a result of the fire at the data center that started Saturday afternoon. The company’s messenger and services offered by related companies were unavailable, degraded or intermittent for more than 10 hours as backup systems failed to kick in fast enough.

Hong admitted that the backup system failed to activate in a timely manner.

"The belated repairs are attributed to the fact that major tools and systems used by developers were not dualized, although we built a dual backup system for data storage and software," the co-CEO said, adding that it will take around two months to correct the developers' faulty system.

BY PARK EUN-JEE [park.eunjee@joongang.co.kr]