Data Center Fire Leads to Outage for Samsung Devices

A major fire at a Samsung data center in Gwacheon, South Korea Sunday morning caused a data outage for global users of Samsung devices, including smart TVs, phones and tablets.

One staffer sustained minor injuries, suffering cuts and scratches from falling debris as portions of the four-story building’s facade fell off due to damage from the fire.

Samsung acknowledged the fire in a blog post, reporting that the staff was able to evacuate the facility. Samsung SDS said an investigation was underway to determine the cause of the fire. Data services were affected for several hours before being restored at about 6 a.m. Eastern time.

This clearly wasn’t a “smoke incident” but a fully-involved building fire, as shown in photos posted on social media, like this one:

Photo of Yonhap showing materials of Samsung SDS building is falling off because of fire,. pic.twitter.com/E1gzO9t3ff

— Jaehwan Cho 조재환 (@hohocho) April 20, 2014

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