Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Damaged undersea cables affect Internet in PH, Asia-Pacific

by Victor Barreiro Jr.
MANILA, Philippines (UPDATED) – An Internet connectivity issue is currently affecting a large portion of the Asia-Pacific region.
Damaged submarine cables connecting 9 countries – including the Philippines – to the rest of the world online are causing issues for many Internet Service Providers (ISPs) locally and in the region.
At least two Philippine ISPs outlined the cause of the country’s connection issues. Eastern Telecommunications and PLDT said damage to the Asia-Pacific Cable Network 2 (APCN2) last week caused the running issue.

While Internet traffic was rerouted, the damage caused slower connections across the region. Eastern said it expects repairs to be completed on April 4 while PLDT says services will be restored mid-April.
In an email to subscribers, Eastern Telecom explained, "An existing submarine cable break at S4A that happened on March 21, together with the submarine cable break that happened at S6 segment on March 23 of APCN2” caused a double failure. Several Eastern Telecom IP Uplinks were isolated as a result. Full story on Rappler