Day: November 18, 2023

SEOUL, The government’s online administrative network remained inaccessible for the second day Saturday, disrupting online state public services, officials said.

The network, Saeol, has become inaccessible since 8:40 a.m. Friday, halting municipal government document services, according to the Ministry of Interior and Safety.

The government’s online civil service portal, Government24, also went down later in the day, leading to an unprecedented situation where all services of government-issued certificates and documents to the public became paralyzed.

The disruption has reportedly been caused by an error in the authentication process in accessing Saeol.

Some 100 network equipment company officials and public officials have been attempting to fix the issue at the National Information Resources Service in Daejeon, 139 kilometers south of Seoul, where the interior ministry’s network servers are located.

On Saturday, Prime Minister Han Duck-soo convened a meeting of relevant agencies to discuss response measures, apologized over the service disruptions and vowed to make all-out efforts for the recovery, according to his office.

“I apologize over the inconvenience and confusion experienced by the public from the halt to civil services of public agencies,” Han said. “We are making all-out recovery efforts with private sector experts, and we will do our best for a swift normalization.”

President Yoon Suk Yeol ordered Friday the creation of a task force to handle the breakdown of the government’s online civil service portal. Yoon is currently in San Francisco, where he is attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit.

Source: Yonhap News Agency

SAN FRANCISCO, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida agreed Friday to work together to cut costs and establish international rules in the hydrogen sector.

During a discussion at Stanford University, the two leaders talked about ways their countries can cooperate in the hydrogen sector, given South Korea’s wide use of hydrogen cars and Japan’s large number of hydrogen-related patents.

Both Yoon and Kishida attended the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in San Francisco this week.

The discussion came a day after they held a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the APEC summit, their seventh bilateral summit this year, as Seoul and Tokyo push to mend and develop their relationship after years of tensions over historical disputes.

Yoon recalled that he and Kishida and U.S. President Joe Biden agreed during their trilateral summit at Camp David in August to develop the trilateral partnership into a comprehensive cooperation mechanism.

He said the three countries should especially strengthen cooperation in areas such as advanced technology, AI and digital governance, carbon reduction and the transition to clean energy.

Yoon and Kishida also took part in a moderated discussion with former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, before taking questions from Stanford University students.

Ahead of the discussion, the two leaders met with a group of South Korean and Japanese startup representatives working in Silicon Valley.

South Korea plans to open a Korea Startup Center in Tokyo early next year to serve as a hub for startup exchanges between the two countries, the presidential office said.

Source: Yonhap News Agency