Lee Min-hyung joined The Korea Times in 2014 and has worked as a journalist mainly in Korea’s finance, tech and automotive industry. He specializes in content creation, breaking news and in-depth analysis currently on transportation and mobility. You can reach him via mhlee@koreatimes.co.kr.
K bank's reliability called into question over system error
K bank headquarters in Seoul / Yonhap
By Lee Min-hyung
By Lee Min-hyung
K bank is facing questions from customers about its reliability after its service was unavailable for around seven hours from Thursday afternoon due to a server storage problem.
The internet-only lender restarted its mobile app's service from around 4 a.m. Friday. But users stepped up criticism of the company because it failed to give any specific notice or update about the disruption once its service had been resumed.
Upbit users were also hit by the latest incident, as they could not send or receive Korean won during the service outage. K bank is the only affiliated lender for the nation's largest cryptocurrency exchange, so the breakdown in operations blocked Upbit customers from making any transactions with the local currency.
The negative sentiment of K bank customers reached a peak overnight because the incident erupted at a critical time when a group of big financial players here and abroad displayed unstable signals over their service management. Last week, the abrupt bankruptcy of the once-popular global crypto exchange, FTX, came as a big shock to investors here and abroad, ringing alarm bells for conventional financial players over whether they are resilient enough to break through the potential liquidity crises.
The system shutdown also came only about a month after K bank's biggest rival, KakaoBank, also suffered a similar incident. At that time, KakaoBank users couldn't access the banking app for hours due to a data center fire of its mother firm, Kakao.
The latest scandal is expected to deal a severe blow to the overall image of mobile banks and emerging fintech players over their credibility, as no conventional banking groups have recently been mired in such a controversy.
The bank pledged to come up with specific measures to prevent the recurrence of such incidents.
“We will analyze the exact cause of the incident, and strengthen measures to prevent its recurrence,” a K bank spokesperson said. “Regarding those who expressed complaints over the service outage, we will also come up with optimal solutions for each case.”
Commencing service in 2017, K bank is the nation's first-generation internet-only lender. The company achieved a turnaround for the first time last year, and plans to go public early next year.
Shares of the lender fell by 3.94 percent on Friday from a day earlier on the unlisted stock trading platform, Securities Plus Unlisted.