Kakao users look for alternatives after outage

Record ID: 1693523

  • Title: Kakao users look for alternatives after outage
  • Date: 17th October 2022
  • Summary: SEONGNAM, SOUTH KOREA (OCTOBER 17, 2022) (REUTERS) EXTERIOR OF DATA CENTRE THAT CAUSED KAKAO OUTAGE VARIOUS OF FORENSIC INVESTIGATION TEAM GATHERING OUTSIDE OF THE BUILDING SIGN ON CAR READING (Korean and English): "NATIONAL FORENSIC SERVICE" NATIONAL FORENSIC SERVICE (NIS) TEAM MEMBERS KOREA ELECTRIC POWER COOPERATION (KEPCO) MEMBERS (IN BLUE PROTECTIVE SUITS) / POLICE OF
  • Embargoed: 31st October 2022 10:16
  • Keywords: Kakao Kakao talk analyst chat data centre fire outage reaction taxi users
  • Location: SEONGNAM, SEOUL, ASAN, SOUTH KOREA
  • City: SEONGNAM, SEOUL, ASAN, SOUTH KOREA
  • Country: South Korea
  • Topics: Asia / Pacific,Company News Markets,Economic Events
  • Reuters ID: LVA001267417102022RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Users of popular apps developed by South Korean tech conglomerate Kakao Corp began to seek alternatives on Monday (October 17), after an outage caused disruptions to a range of related services from instant messaging, taxis, restaurant bookings to payments.
    The outage was caused by a fire at a data centre near Seoul on Saturday (October 15) and while systems had mostly been restored by Monday, the various service disruptions have raised questions about public reliance on the app.
    "I'm planning to use one or two alternative apps, because if KakaoTalk is stopped again, we won't be able to contact or communicate with others," said Kim Jae-hun, a user of the messaging app.
    Users of ‘Kakao T’, a taxi-hailing app, also experienced service disruption.
    On Monday, rival messaging service LINE zoomed to the top of iPhone App Store's most downloaded apps in South Korea, having not even ranked in the top 100 on Friday (October 14), according to SensorTower data. KakaoTalk fell to 36th from 13th.
    Kakao said on Sunday (October 16) while its servers are distributed across four data centres, the fire-hit data centre housed 32,000, or the main share, of its servers, which lost power and were damaged as a result of the blaze.
    (Production: Daewoung Kim, Dogyun Kim, Hyeyeon Kim, Minwoo Park)
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2022. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
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