Alipay suffers temporary breakdown

The display screen of a cellphone shows that Alipay is temporarily inaccessible in Hangzhou city, capital of East China's Zhejiang province, May 27, 2015. [Photo/IC]

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's financial affiliate announced on Wednesday night its mobile payment platform Alipay had resumed services after a temporary breakdown due to optical fiber problems.

Zhejiang Ant Small and Micro Financial Services Group Co Ltd, owner of Alipay, said the breakdown was caused by a construction project that cut part of optical fiber lines in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province where one of its major computer center is based.

At 5 pm on Wednesday, users in Beijing, Zhejiang and other cities reported problems in using Alipay. They could't log in to the mobile payment platform, transfer money or pay bills.

The company said Alipay is well-equipped to ensure the security of money stored in users' accounts. As the largest mobile payment service provider in China, Alipay boasts 270 million active users.

Cheng Li, chief technology operator of Alipay, said after the incident the company had moved quickly to divert traffic to computer bases in other cities and the service had been resumed in two hours.

Technology experts said the broken optical fiber hadn't been repaired yet but they are trying to minimize the negative impact of the incident.

This is not the first time that Chinese Internet companies have suffered from optical fiber cable failures. Last October, Wechat, the most popular instant messaging services offered by Tencent Holdings Ltd, also experienced similar problems. Some users were unable to access Wechat because of problems in its Shanghai-based computer center.