Believe it or not, one of the home appliances many people fear breaking the most is the refrigerator, because once it breaks, all the food inside may be ruined. But that nightmare became reality for quite a few households in Korea that had bought Samsung AI refrigerators. Starting on the afternoon of September 22, some Samsung Bespoke AI refrigerators in Korea collectively stopped working after receiving a software update, with their screens stuck on “업데이트 중” (Korean for “updating”). What was outrageous was that the refrigerator’s interior lighting went out and the compressor also stopped running. Samsung confirmed that the cause was internal testing software being mistakenly sent to the official deployment channel for regular customers.
The awkward part is that the timing falls right before the Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) holiday, when most families had already stuffed their refrigerators with ribs, Hanwoo beef, and fruit for ancestral rites. Another comment on social media put it more vividly: “I tapped update on the way home for the holiday and I’m going crazy.” Someone else said they had never imagined in their life that a refrigerator could turn into a brick. Samsung’s own community was flooded with dozens of posts reporting the same symptoms from the afternoon of the 22nd to the morning of the 23rd, while the official announcement did not appear until around 11 a.m. on the 23rd; the time gap became another source of consumer frustration.
The fridge is bricked: the light won’t come on, it’s not cooling, and the door handle sensor has stopped working.
Most of the affected units are Bespoke AI four-door refrigerators launched after 2024, including the RM70F and RM80F series, covering the 900-liter flagship model and the 600-liter Kitchen Fit model designed for apartment kitchens. One of the specific models named by the Korean media is the 2025 Bespoke AI four-door 905L (RM70F90R2ZD).
The common symptom is the classic “bricking”: the update progress bar freezes, and afterward the screen only displays “업데이트 중”; no touch command responds; when the door is opened, the interior LED does not light up, the compressor and refrigerant circulation stop completely, and the refrigerator and freezer compartments warm up to room temperature.
Consumers’ accounts of the timeline are very specific. One user tapped the update notification around 4:30 p.m. on the 22nd and then went off to do other things. At 7 p.m., they opened the refrigerator and found the light wasn’t on, the LED only showed “updating,” and the refrigerator appeared offline in SmartThings—all in less than three hours. Trying to fix it themselves only made things worse. Some consumers searched online for solutions and flipped the main breaker off and then back on, only for the LED screen to die as well.
The repair is scheduled for after the long weekend.
What made consumers even more dissatisfied was the repair scheduling. Users who requested emergency repairs from the service center were told that in-home service would be scheduled for October 1 or October 7, meaning a wait of up to two weeks from the day the incident occurred. Some users were told it would be after September 29, or even not until October, and one person shot back, “Are you saying you’ll wait until all the food has spoiled before coming to check?”
“명절 음식 다 상한다”‥’먹통’ 된 삼성 냉장고#MBC #뉴스 #뉴스데스크 #MBC뉴스 #뉴스투데이
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— MBC News (MBC뉴스) (@mbcnews) September 24, 2026
Social media comments are filled with concrete losses: “I threw away 20 kilograms of food waste today alone,” “What am I supposed to do with the holiday ribs I received?” “Premium Korean beef is spoiling in real time.” Some also said, “The refrigerator department said they can’t handle the power issue and have to wait for an engineer to arrive,” while others were turned away with “parts are unavailable.”
Samsung admits fault: test software went through the wrong channel.
Samsung Electronics publicly acknowledged the leak of internal test software. A company representative said it has confirmed that internal test software was mistakenly delivered to some products due to an error in the operational deployment process; after discovering the anomaly, it immediately halted all update rollouts and mobilized available engineers and service networks to carry out on-site repairs.
Korean media reported that this was not a refrigerator hardware defect, nor a platform-wide failure of SmartThings. After the error occurred, Samsung set up an emergency response team, aiming to complete recovery by September 24. Repair costs will be entirely free, while compensation for spoiled food is still under internal discussion.
Determining compensation is not easy. Central Daily News pointed out that meat and fruit with receipts are relatively easy to prove, but for frozen foods stored long-term or homemade holiday dishes, it is very difficult to prove the amount of loss.
The holiday service arrangements also complicate the situation. Service centers are closed on the first day of the Chuseok holiday, September 24, and on Chuseok itself, September 25. On the 26th and 27th, nine weekend care centers across Korea will be open and accept advance reservations, including Samsung Gangnam in Seoul, Hongdae, Bucheon Jung-dong, Seongnam, Yongin Guseong, Daejeon, Gwangju Gwangsan, Daegu Nam-gu, and Busan Dongnae. However, these centers handle mobile phones, tablets, and wearables; urgent cases such as refrigerators with cooling or freezing malfunctions are handled by on-duty customer service and in-home service engineers through emergency dispatch.
Consumer’s question: The update failed, so why did refrigeration stop as well?
There are two main concerns in the community. First, whether the update was adequately validated beforehand; one consumer said bluntly, “If you’re going to release an update, at least test it first. I never in my life thought a refrigerator could get bricked.” Second, consumers have no recovery method, and posts like “Can’t they even roll back an update?” keep appearing in the community.
Korean media noted that this is not the first SmartThings-related incident. In October 2024, when Galaxy smartphones were experiencing endless reboots, the automatic update of the SmartThings framework was also listed as a possible cause; more recently, there was a case of the AI speaker Bixby Home Mini going down. One consumer directly tallied it up in an online community, saying that major errors in the IoT and home appliance sectors have already happened a third time.
Conclusion
Refrigerators used to be white goods, with quality judged by the durability of the motor and compressor. Now they run an operating system, communication modules, and AI algorithms, making them embedded networked computers whose functions can be changed remotely via OTA after delivery. This incident lays the risks of this approach bare: the problem is no longer just a feature, but the entire machine’s basic purpose.
There is currently no indication that this incident has spread beyond the South Korean market, and Samsung has not yet said whether other markets worldwide use the same batch of firmware and deployment process. For Taiwanese consumers who have already bought models in the same series, the answer to this question is more practical than any compensation plan.
Source: KOCPC Chinese