KT said on March 18 it won a project from the National Fire Agency to establish an information system master plan for building a next-generation 119 integrated system and has begun designing an AI and cloud-based disaster response framework.

KT will carry out the project through a consortium with Konec, VTW, Next I&I and MTData. The KT consortium received high marks for areas including building and implementing emergency communications infrastructure and a public safety network, high-reliability and high-availability ICT capabilities and technical expertise, and a non-stop operations framework and disaster recovery (DR) center plan based on cloud-native architecture.

The project is a top-level planning initiative to convert 119 report intake, dispatch command and situation monitoring systems, which are operated separately by 19 provincial and metropolitan fire headquarters nationwide, into a national integrated platform based on AI and cloud. After signing the contract, the KT consortium plans over about 180 days to prepare a detailed system design and implementation strategy for tendering the next-generation 119 integrated system construction project.

The next-generation 119 integrated system to be built will have key functions including AI speech recognition-based report intake, a nationwide integrated geographic information system, automatic reporting via multiple media, video and the Internet of Things, and an ultra-wide-area dispatch system not limited by jurisdiction. It will automatically classify urgency even when reports surge, enabling faster responses. It is also expected to enable efficient mobilisation and command of nationwide firefighting resources during large-scale and complex disasters.

KT plans, during the ISMP process, to present a non-stop operations framework and a DR center plan based on cloud-native architecture, along with data integration and standardisation strategies, to secure both system stability and scalability. It also plans to derive needed legal and institutional improvements and directions for reorganising organisational and operational frameworks to ensure stable operations after the system is built.