Census system crashes around country
The computerised system for conducting the Thai census crashed nationwide yesterday, and the authorities were trying to fix it, a senior official at the Department of Provincial Administration said.
Registration Office director Thawatchai Thammarak pointed out that the system had been in use for nine years, which was beyond the normal usage of six years. The malfunction left district offices unable to issue national ID cards or house registrations, so it also affected passport issuance by the Foreign Ministry’s Department of Consular Affairs, he said.
The office pulled information from a backup database at the Registration Office’s Service Area 1 Office (Wang Chai Ya) to use instead of the database at the Registration Office’s Service Area 2 (Khlong 9 Lam Lukka). The system should be back to normal today, he said. The Registration Office was discussing other solutions in case this wasn’t successful, he said.
Thawatchai admitted problems with the computerised system for the Thai census had persisted for three or four years and that, due to a previous controversy over database procurement, the department couldn’t find new computers purchased for it and had simply maintained its ageing system. He said they couldn’t find parts for maintenance, while procurement of new tools was stuck in red tape and was still under consideration by the Office of the Attorney General.
The director of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration’s Administration and Registration Division, Supapong Kritsanapan, said the city, after getting notification from the Department of Provincial Administration that the system was down, issued a memo to all 50 district offices to inform the public that related work was suspended. As it wasn’t sure when the system would be back to normal, he urged the public to call their district office to check whether the system was back before leaving home.
