Daejeon: A total of 91 online government services have been restored following an outage caused by a fire at the state data management agency. The fire, which occurred last week, disrupted operations at the National Information Resources Service (NIRS) in Daejeon, approximately 140 kilometers south of Seoul.

According to Yonhap News Agency, as of 2 p.m., the restoration rate reached 14.1 percent, with 91 out of 647 services affected by the fire being brought back online. These services include 20 out of 36 “Grade 1” services, which are deemed essential due to their impact and number of users.

Vice Interior Minister Kim Min-jae, speaking at a press briefing in Sejong, stated that systems on the second, third, and fourth floors of the NIRS building have been reactivated. These floors were less impacted by the blaze, which originated on the fifth floor. The fire started in server room 7-1, destroying 96 systems and damaging a total of 330 systems across server rooms 7 and 8.

Kim noted that despite some inconveniences, essential services such as Gov.kr and unmanned civil application service machines are operational, reducing confusion in public services like resident registration and passport services. However, he acknowledged ongoing issues with online services related to real estate transactions and social security information systems and promised updates on system recoveries and alternative solutions.

The government plans to disclose the full list of the 647 affected services and its recovery strategy. A complete recovery is anticipated to take at least four weeks, longer than the initially projected two weeks, due to the relocation of 96 destroyed systems to the NIRS branch in Daegu.

Interior Minister Yun Ho-jung emphasized the importance of transparency in recovery efforts during a meeting of the government’s Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters. To minimize public inconvenience ahead of the extended Chuseok holiday, the government prioritized the restoration of high-demand services, including the national postal service’s postal and banking arms. Gov.kr, a key government portal for civil application services, has also been restored.

A police investigation is ongoing to determine the cause of the fire, which was triggered by a lithium-ion battery explosion in a server room on the fifth floor and was completely extinguished by Saturday.