Next month, the revised electronic government law will be implemented, and the solutions industry is rolling out public information technology (IT) automation solutions. This is because the revision includes the introduction of a regular management system for each institution, increasing the need for automation solutions to efficiently carry out this task.
According to the solutions industry on the 17th, the revised electronic government law will take effect on July 8. This law passed the National Assembly plenary session in December of last year and was promulgated in January this year. However, considering the budget and preparation status of the applicable institutions, it is planned to be applied at a recommendation level this year and made mandatory from next year. The revision of the electronic government law was prompted by an incident in November 2023 when the National Administrative Computer Network was down for more than 46 hours. At that time, major public systems like Government24, the New Administrative System, and the civil servant messenger were simultaneously paralyzed, temporarily halting nationwide civil service work. Recovery took dozens of hours, impacting not only citizens but also public servants.
In response to this incident, the government recognized the limitations of leaving incident response to the autonomy of each institution and began the legislative amendment process. The core of this amendment is to systematically manage information system failures in administrative and public institutions and to establish a legal basis for rapid response and recovery in case of failures. Accordingly, each institution must establish and implement a failure management plan, which will be inspected by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety. Additionally, they must designate information system grades based on the importance and impact of the systems, and the post-management system has also been strengthened.
To this end, the government announced an information system preventive inspection manual for establishing a pre-inspection system for public information systems. This manual includes 121 items and specifies the inspection cycles and record criteria from the status of the central processing unit (CPU) and disk, to certificate validity periods, response times, and backup status. Consequently, each institution must create inspection records daily or monthly, which serve as evidence to verify whether preventive measures were taken in the event of a failure.
However, on the ground, there have been constant criticisms that there is insufficient manpower and budget to manually check dozens of information systems every day. According to the 'Administrative and Public Institutions Information Resource Statistics' published by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety in 2023, there are a total of 17,902 information systems operated by public institutions nationwide, 66% of which, or 11,821 systems, are operated without separate advancements. Many institutions have experienced a lack of standardization in inspection or response systems, leading to continued system aging and reliance on manual processes, primarily due to manpower and budget constraints.
In anticipation of the law's enforcement, the solutions industry is launching public IT automation solution products. RTNET Solution introduced the IT automation solution 'FAP' on the 16th, reflecting the information system preventive inspection manual. FAP offers a web-based flowchart-style GUI construction optimized for the domestic IT environment and a 100% Korean-language menu for an intuitive user experience. Additionally, it is capable of customized designs for each institution through more than 7,300 modules applicable to various operating environments. In particular, it supports the full automation of 121 routine inspection items, reducing reliance on manual processes and increasing operational speed and accuracy.
Mantech Solution also launched the public IT automation solution 'MDRM.' This solution provides workflow-based business process management, daily inspection automation, operational procedure validation, real-time monitoring, result automatic reporting, and history management functions. It is said to automate complex tasks and standardize preventive management to enhance audit response capability and system reliability. Currently, MDRM is being operated by public institutions such as the National Pension Service, the Korea Internet & Security Agency, the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, the Korea Water Resources Corporation, the National Election Commission, and the Korea Deposit Insurance Corporation.
The solutions industry expects the IT automation solution market to continue to grow. According to Global Market Insights, the global data center automation market size is projected to grow more than fourfold from $11.4 billion (15.7 trillion won) in 2023 to $50.2 billion (69 trillion won) by 2034. In particular, the domestic IT automation solution market size is expected to reach 1 trillion won by 2034. The industry believes that the recent revision of the electronic government law will lay the institutional foundation for automation adoption, disseminating demand beyond the public sector to the private sector.
An official from the solutions industry noted, "It is practically impossible for people to manually perform the information system preventive inspection manual announced by the government every time," and added, "With this law amendment, the IT infrastructure operation of public institutions is now inevitably transitioning to automation." They further remarked, "As the introduction of AI and digital transformation is accelerated, the demand for IT automation solutions is expected to rise even more in the private sector beyond the public sector."