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| This screenshot from Oct. 15 shows an error message when trying to use Kakao Talk's desktop version, due to a fire that broke out and destroyed the company's main data center in Pangyo, Gyeonggi Province that day. Yonhap |
By Lee Hae-rin
A group of consumers with an attorney are preparing a class action lawsuit against Kakao to seek compensation for damages suffered due to the fire that destroyed its main data center on Oct. 15.
Shin Jae-youn, a partner attorney at Seoul-based law firm LKB & Partners, set up an online community titled, "Compensation for damages due to Kakao Talk fire disruption," on Sunday.
The attorney posted that those who experienced inconveniences and damages from the disruption and wish to take part in the class action suit against Kakao are encouraged to leave a message with details about what kind of damage they experienced.
"No matter what the cause of the fire, claims can be made against Kakao for damages over its negligence in not preparing for such a situation in advance," he said.
As of Tuesday at noon, 137 people, most of whom identified themselves as business owners and company workers who rely heavily on Kakao's mobile messenger and Daum's and Kakao's email services to communicate and suffered grave setbacks at work, have joined Shin's online community.
In a phone interview with The Korea Times on Monday, Shin said that this incident is the first case in which a large number of people suffered damages directly related to a communication service disruption. The attorney said that free users of Kakao's affected services could also get compensation for their losses, provided that there is proof that the damages were caused by a Kakao service.
"It (Kakao Talk) is a free service, but that does not mean that it is exempt from its responsibility to compensate for consumers for damages. The company profits enormously from its business, which almost all Koreans rely heavily on, so accordingly, it should be held more heavily accountable," Shin said.
There are likely to be more victims than those who joined his online community and he may file a lawsuit with Kakao for not having prepared for such a situation in advance, regardless of the cause of the fire, the attorney said.
Shin has represented several class action suits for consumer damages, including the case of Terra-Luna cryptocurrency victims against the co-founder of Terraform Labs, Do Kwon, and the case against Kakao Games by users of the company's latest mobile game, Uma Musume.
Meanwhile, other experts are skeptical about the class action suit's chance of winning the case.
Ted Koo, an IT-specialized attorney at Seoul-based law firm Lin, told The Korea Times that Kakao could not have foreseen this type of damage to free users of its services. Thus, he believes it is unlikely that the company will be held responsible for providing compensation.
Also, the fact there were alternative services that consumers could have used instead could lower their chances of getting compensation, Koo said. Most of the services that went haywire over the weekend are not monopolized by Kakao. For example, Line and Telegram are available, although they are not as widely used.
However, Shin refuted Koo's point. "There are several alternative services to those of Kakao (that were disrupted over the weekend), but considering the number of its users, Kakao overwhelms all the others (in Korea). The fact that there are alternative services to Kakao may limit its responsibility to provide damage compensation to a certain extent, but that should not exempt it entirely," Shin said.
On Sunday, Kakao announced it will compensate paid users of the company's webtoon app and music streaming platform Melon by extending users' paid memberships for three days. The company formed an emergency planning committee to figure out compensation measures for the rest of the victims of the service disruption.
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