NTSA, Kenya Railways announce service interruptions over system glitches

Kenya Railways and the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) are the latest state agencies to report problems with their service accessibility.

NTSA said the disruption has been brought about by a cyberattack on the e-Citizen platform. However, the authority assured that all the other services relating to motor vehicle registration, transfer of ownership, and motor vehicle inspection are operational and accessible.

“Service accessibility update; further to our earlier communication, accessibility to some of our services, including driver testing and licensing and public service vehicle licensing, is affected by an intermittent connection on the eCitizen network. 

“We do apologize for any inconvenience caused. The technical team is working to resolve the issue,” NTSA said in a statement.

Kenya Railways attacked

On the other hand, Kenya Railways confirmed that there is a system problem that has affected the purchase of tickets by their customers, however, the transport provider said they are working hard to restore their services.

“We are experiencing a system hitch affecting the purchase of tickets by customers. This is due to an outage on our service provider’s network. 

“We are working with the service provider to restore normalcy as soon as possible. We apologize for the inconvenience caused,” Railways’ statement signed by the director said.

Ministry’s explanation

With the ongoing disruption of online services reported, the ICT Ministry on Thursday blamed the system hitched on attempted cyber attacks.

“Over the past one week, there have been unsuccessful cyberattack attempts targeting both the Government and the Private sectors. The eCitizen Portal is among the targets of these unsuccessful attacks.

“These attempts have, however, been rebuffed by the security systems and applications in place. Shortly, we will revert to optimal utilization levels.

“The relevant Government of Kenya agencies are on high alert and have enhanced the security of the eCitizen portal and all Government Services Sites. All Systems and Portals under the control of the Government of Kenya are safe,” ICT CS Eliud Owalo said in a statement.

Although the government has yet to confirm who is behind the cyberattacks or attempted hacking on critical state infrastructure, a group called Anonymous Sudan has claimed responsibility.