KAKAO TALK HOLDS NEWS CONFERENCE

[Anchor Lead]

Kakao Talk has held a news conference to apologize to the public for the disruption of its messenger app caused by a fire at its data center. The company has acknowledged its backup system failed to activate. The co-CEO of Kakao Corporation, Namkoong Whon, has resigned from his post.

[Pkg]

Kakao Co-CEOs Namkoong Whon and Hong Eun-taek have apologized to the public four days after the company's unprecedented server outage, after service operations have in effect been normalized. They first apologized for delays in service recovery because the dual backup system of the company's software programs did not activate properly.

[Soundbite] Hong Eun-taek(Kakao co-CEO) : "Our customers’ data and major service application programs were dualized, but the tools used by developers were not, which has led to a fatal problem."

Namkoong Whon said he's taking responsibility for the server outage and stepping down as Kakao's co-CEO.

[Soundbite] Namkoong Whon(Kakao co-CEO) : "I will resign as CEO and join our emergency disaster task force to improve our services and make up for what we lack."

To prevent recurrences, Namkoong has pledged to build a perfect dual backup system within two months, as soon as the Pangyo data center is stabilized. The company has set up a web page on their mobile app for receiving reports of damages caused by the server disruption. Kakao has vowed to pay out compensation to users even before it begins a liability dispute with SK, its data center operator. The company says it'll consider compensation not only for its paid users but for many others who have sustained losses due to its massive server outage. Kakao says for the time being it will be operated solely by Hong Eun-taek, while global projects planned by Namkoong Whon will carry on as planned.