Fire breaks out at Korea National Information Resources Management Agency, which manages 647 government systems, suspending services



On September 26, 2025, a fire broke out at the Daejeon National Information Resources Management Agency, which manages a total of 647 business systems, including the government's legal information system, civil servant administrative network, and mobile ID service. The fire was extinguished after about 22 hours, and some services have resumed, but it is expected to take a considerable amount of time for all services to be restored.

Fire at government data center halts 647 systems, disrupts services - The Korea Herald

https://www.koreaherald.com/article/10584785





The fire broke out around 8:15 PM on September 26, 2025. At the time, 13 external workers were replacing UPS lithium batteries in the computer room on the fifth floor of the Management Institute. After removing the batteries, they were to be transported to the first basement floor. However, about 40 minutes after removal, one of the batteries suddenly ignited, causing a fire.

60cm long 384cm… 60cm long
https://www.chosun.com/national/national_general/2025/09/29/FYKFHFFVQREVJIFJ3VY63QX6FA/

The fire caused the temperature inside the computer room to exceed 160 degrees, making it uncontrollable, and the management office, concerned that damage would be caused to other servers, decided to turn off the power while it was still safe.

At around 3:20 a.m. on September 27, firefighters used a ladder truck to break down the computer room's windows and the inner bulkhead, successfully venting the smoke. The fire was extinguished at around 6:30 a.m., but flames began to rise again just after 8 a.m., and it was not fully extinguished until around 6 p.m. on the 27th, 22 hours after the fire began.

The servers in the computer room were installed 1.2 meters apart, and hundreds of batteries were piled up in the hallway. To extinguish the fire, firefighters had to either pour large amounts of water on the servers or immerse the batteries in water to cool them down. However, because the servers in the computer room contained important government information, firefighters tried using small amounts of water or carbon dioxide gas to extinguish the fire. It took 22 hours to extinguish the fire.

By the time the fire was extinguished, 384 batteries and 740 surrounding server devices had been burned.

The LG Electronics battery that caused the problem was installed in August 2014, one year past the 10-year manufacturer's warranty. The UPS was supposed to be turned off before the battery could be replaced, but the technician may have disengaged the battery while it was still connected to the power source.

Furthermore, the distance between the battery and the server was only 60cm, despite the Korea Fire Prevention Association's requirement that a minimum of 90cm be maintained.

Professor Kong Ha-seong of the Department of Fire and Disaster Prevention at Mataishi University commented, 'The damage was so great because the main facilities were concentrated in the same space.'

Normally, such an important network would have a backup system to switch over to in case of a problem, but the NCAC did not have one, leading President Lee Jae-myung to criticize the NCAC, saying, 'The NCAC boasted that it would be restored in three hours, but it has still not been restored two days later.' In particular, South Korea experienced a similar large-scale network outage in 2023, so President Lee stated, 'Two years have passed, and the failure to protect the nation's core network is likely what led to this major outage, and a thorough investigation is necessary.'

Lee, 국가정보자원관리원 화재에
https://www.chosun.com/politics/blue_house/2025/09/28/7QOOGF56JNGQRH74GP53III5Q4/

Related Posts:

in Note, Posted by logc_nt