Old infrastructure cause of easy-pay outage

The nationwide Easy-Pay system outage has been attributed to PNG Power’s aging infrastructure, including outdated seven-digit meter boxes and reliance on an offshore data center that proved unreliable during the disruption.

PNG Power Chief Executive Officer, Paul Bayly dismissed allegations of hacking or internal sabotage, stressing that the system had shown faults two weeks before the system outage.

Management has assured the public that staff are working tirelessly to fully restore services, with gradual access being extended to third party vendors.

CEO Bayly revealed today that the company’s “easy-pay system” began fluctuating two weeks ago.

Despite efforts by engineers and the IT team to stabilize it, the system ultimately crashed, leaving the entire country sourcing for electricity over the past four days.

"We noted about two weeks ago that the system started to fluctuate in terms of its performance.

"There is no hacking of the system, the nationwide easy-pay system has been out because of old equipment," he said.

He added that PNG Power’s reliance on an offshore data center also contributed to the delay in restoring services.

PNG Power Management is now considering relocating the easy-pay system and its data to a Papua New Guinea–based center to improve responsiveness and strengthen reliability.

"This outage has highlighted a deeper issue, the risks associated when we have a third party managing a critical national infrastructure that is why PNG power has taken decisive action to transition the access to easy-pay system and its data back under national control and we are going to be using a PNG based data." He said.

Meanwhile, PNG Power has launched the Easy-Pay Token Relief Portal to assist customers who paid during the recent outage but did not receive their token.

Customer Care teams are available to support affected customers and to guide those transitioning from 7 digit to 11 digit meter boxes.

The easy-pay system is back online in almost all third-party vending services throughout the country.