The Korea Communications Commission discussed possible punitive measures against KT Corp., which limited Internet access for Samsung-made smart televisions for five days, during a regular meeting of its leadership on Wednesday.

The state-run telecom regulator also decided to seek ways to punish Samsung for causing the service shutdown as it refused to talk with KT over the network use of its smart TV owners.

As part of their agreement announced Tuesday, KT resumed Internet services like video-on-demand and smart TV applications immediately, while Samsung withdrew a lawsuit against KT.

Even though the harm from the incident, which affected an estimated 300,000 TV sets nationwide, was considered moderate, criticism is growing against the two companies for dragging their customers into their failed negotiations.

“It’s not right that business operators hold their users hostage when they fail to reach an agreement,” said KCC commissioner Shin Yong-sub.

“Under their consumer policy, KT should have posted the service shutdown notice a week ago. But they cut the service one day after the announcement.”

Yang Moon-seok, another commissioner, also stressed strict action.

“We should not excuse them because they reached an agreement,” Yang said.

The KCC had originally planned to issue a corrective order against KT. With the surprise service resumption on Tuesday, however, industry sources predict a low possibility of the two major firms facing harsh punishment.

By Lee Ji-yoon (jylee@heraldcorp.com)