[Audit Spotlight] Park Jeonghun Flags Gaps in Pre-Checks and Oversight After 'Early Admissions Outage'

At a National Assembly Education Committee audit on October 12, lawmakers continued to criticize the outage of the online application system for the 2027 academic year’s early admission process. Rep. Park Jeonghun of the People Power Party pointed to shortcomings in both Uway Apply’s pre-launch checks and the Korea Council for University Education (KCUE)’s reporting and oversight system.

People Power Party lawmaker Park Jung-hoon answers reporters' questions after concluding a press conference at the National Assembly Communication Center on Sept. 14 regarding allegations surrounding Justice Minister nominee Kim Seung-won. 2026.09.14 Photo by Yoon Dongju

During the audit of the KCUE and other institutions under the committee’s jurisdiction, Rep. Park questioned whether Uway Apply’s checks had been sufficient, citing mock exercise materials he had obtained in advance. He said the company had verified that the system worked after an operating system (OS) update but had not conducted a load test simulating a surge in traffic near the application deadline.

“After checking with experts, I was told that the exercise seems to have amounted to little more than turning the power on and off,” Rep. Park said. “That means they did not check whether the server would run into problems when traffic surged in a short period.” Seong Yunseok, CEO of Uway Apply, acknowledged that “no load test was conducted.”

Rep. Park also closely examined the KCUE’s pre-launch inspection and reporting procedures, given that it is responsible for operating the standard common application service. When Rep. Park asked whether the council had checked how the OS updates were handled in June and July, KCUE Chairman Lee Gijeong said, “I was not briefed.”

Rep. Park also questioned the expertise of the KCUE staff in charge. Asked whether he knew that the two staff members responsible had handled hardware rather than being software experts, Chairman Lee replied, “There may be more if support staff are included,” but added, “I was not aware of the specifics.”

Rep. Park criticized the KCUE, saying, “It had no technical guidelines for operating the application system and did not receive proper reports.” He also said the council had taken no action even though Uway Apply had failed to check crucial matters during its pre-launch inspections.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.