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Nets outage on Feb 2 did not breach authority’s standards: Tharman

SINGAPORE — Although its hour-long service outage on Feb 2 did not breach the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s (MAS) regulatory standards, electronic payment company Nets has tightened the controls of administrators who have access to its systems.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). Reuters file photo

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). Reuters file photo

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SINGAPORE — Although its hour-long service outage on Feb 2 did not breach the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s (MAS) regulatory standards, electronic payment company Nets has tightened the controls of administrators who have access to its systems.

Administrators’ access to the systems has also been limited to off-peak hours, said Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam on Tuesday (Feb 27).

These are interim measures while an independent consultant determines how to minimise chances of human errors and mitigate consequences should errors occur, said Mr Tharman, who is Minister-in-charge of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).

He was responding to a parliamentary question by Member of Parliament (Jurong) Tan Wu Meng on features of Nets’ system that predispose it to “human error” – which Nets cited on Feb 13 as the cause of the disruption.

Elaborating on what caused the incident, Mr Tharman said that an administrator had accidentally executed a command that “abruptly terminated a communications module which is required for connectivity to the banks” during system maintenance.

Nets, which has been designated as a payment system that is considered important for financial stability or for public confidence since 2010, did not breach the MAS’ regulatory standards on recoverability and reliability, Mr Tharman added.

MAS requires operators of designated payment systems to resume operations within four hours following any disruption, and have no more than four hours of downtime over a period of 12 months.

“Nets was prompt in notifying the public about the outage, providing updates, and most Nets Electronic Funds Transfer at Point Of Sale (EFTPOS)’ services were recovered in about one-and-a-half hours,” he said in a written reply.

The MAS will closely monitor its remediation of gaps identified and issue directives if needed, he said.

Besides the EFTPOS, other critical payment systems regulated by MAS include Singapore Dollar Cheque Clearing, Inter-bank GIRO and Fast And Secure Transfers (FAST).

Because no payment system is infallible, Mr Tharman said it is also important to have alternative payment methods in place. During Nets’ outage, many affected customers were able to switch to other e-payment instruments such as debit and credit cards, as well as stored-value transport cards and e-wallets, he noted.

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