South Korea raises cyber threat level after data centre fire
9 hours ago
- #infrastructure
- #cybersecurity
- #South Korea
- South Korea’s intelligence agency raised the national cyber threat level due to concerns about hackers exploiting vulnerabilities after a fire at a government datacentre.
- The fire occurred at the national information resources service in Daejeon, damaging critical digital infrastructure and affecting 647 government systems.
- One worker was injured, and firefighters took 22 hours to extinguish the fire, which started when a lithium-ion battery ignited during relocation.
- Government services like email, intranet, mobile identification, postal banking, and complaint portals were disrupted, impacting schools, tax payments, real estate transactions, and crematorium bookings.
- As of Tuesday, 89 of the 647 affected systems had been restored, but 96 were completely destroyed, with recovery expected to take four weeks.
- President Lee Jae Myung criticized the lack of backup systems and accused officials of poor preparedness.
- The incident raised security concerns ahead of the APEC summit in Gyeongju, which will host leaders from the US, China, and other regional powers.
- A similar lithium-ion battery fire in 2022 crippled Kakao, leading to nationwide chaos and subsequent legislation for mandatory redundancy systems.
- Media outlets criticized South Korea’s IT infrastructure, and politicians traded blame over responsibility for the incident.