Major internet service interruptions ahead??

[TheEnforcer]

Click link for full article.


http://timesonline.typepad.com/technology/2008/12/is-the-internet.html

Breaking news: something's happening to the internet, right now. We're just not quite sure what.

Interoute, the internet networks company, reports that three of the four internet sub-cables that run from Asia to North America have been damaged.

These carry more than 75 per cent of traffic between the Middle East, Europe and America. It's hard to gather what this actually means - is it that the internet is down or (more likely) significantly slower than usual between the Middle East and America? (If you're reading this, let's face it, the internet has not shut down altogether)

But, according to the company, there is a domino effect taking place. Interoute says it is:

hearing that offices have lost their entire private network connectivity. As a result, users are unable to do their daily job over the internet and are turning to their mobile phones to communicate across the globe. This is having a knock on effect on the domestic voice networks, which are getting a surge of calls needing to be routed internationally. These calls need to be routed onto international gateways that pass voice traffic in longer directions around the world to avoid the cable breaks – causing more quality issues and risk more call failures, in turn causing more calls to be placed and increasing the pressure on local voice networks.

[RawAlex]

On the plus side, this will mean much less chinese sourced spam and virus attacks.

[TheEnforcer]

LOL

Yeah.. I suppose so.. lol

[Fausty]

Like the similar incident from last year, this has been confirmed as authentic:

bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=aBa0lTN.dcoQ

However, like last year there seems little if any chance of a "domino effect" of any type resulting from this. Someone wanting to "kill the internet" needs to go after root routers - not a couple of point to point cables. Whatever is behind this latest example, it's not an attempt to take the entire internet down.

Fausty

[kandah]

that would suck bigtime for me

[softball]

that would suck bigtime for me

Try more than one sentence.

[MRock]

Thanks for the article, I had not seen that one. Now I have an explaination for the slowness we have been seeing and the slow loading sites of other companies. Jill and I sometimes look at each other and say "Something wrong with internets today!" and laugh. I hate when it's not something you can fix yourself ...

[Fausty]

{sorry, still lacking sufficient forum permissions to create direct URL links to reference this article source, it is at hxxp://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2008545504_apmlmideastinternetoutage.html -fausty}

---------------------------
Repair crews reach damaged cables in Mediterranean
By ADAM SCHRECK | AP Business Writer


DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A robotic submarine searched beneath the Mediterranean on Sunday for damaged communications cables, two days after Web and telephone access was knocked out for much of the Middle East.

Telecommunication providers from Cairo to Dubai continued Sunday to scramble to reroute voice and data traffic through potentially costly detours in Asia and North America after the lines running under the Mediterranean Sea were damaged Friday.

Internet access was largely knocked out for two days in at least six countries that were affected - Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Sudan and Yemen.

It is the second time this year that trans-Mediterranean cables to Europe have been severed. The earlier cut, in late January, was apparently caused by a ship's anchor.

A ship operated by France Telecom's marine division arrived Sunday afternoon at what it believes is the accident site south of Sicily, spokesman Louis-Michel Aymard said.

The crew released a robotic submarine named "Hector" to search for two of the three damaged cables, which are owned by a consortium that includes the Paris-based telecommunications giant. Once found, the cable ends will be pulled to the surface and repaired on deck - a process that could take several days.

"We have to fix the cable fiber by fiber, and it's a very huge cable," Aymard said. He said the company hopes to have the first line fixed by Thursday.

The third cable is operated by Reliance Globalcom. Officials at that company could not be reached for comment.

Regional communication providers' efforts to redirect voice and data traffic brought some areas back online over the weekend. Still, rolling outages continued to plague large parts of the region.

Emirati provider Etisalat said Internet service remained at about 85 percent capacity Sunday. The Abu Dhabi-based company was redirecting some of its data traffic through South Asia, spokesman Saeed al-Badi said.

Dubai-based Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Co., better known as Du, said it was sending data and international voice traffic through Asia and the western United States.

"Due to the diversion of all traffic ... eastbound ... customers may be experiencing slower Internet access time than usual. This is the same for all Internet traffic from the region and is likely to continue until the cables are repaired," the company said.

The Egyptian government said about 80 percent of Internet services had been restored as of Sunday. Access was knocked out Friday and much of Saturday. Connection speeds were down in Yemen and in Jordan. There were no major outages in Lebanon but some users experienced spotty access.

Dubai-based airline Emirates, one of the Middle East's most visible companies, said it had to cope with a 30 percent slowdown in online booking times and initially faced telephone problems.

Copyright © 2008 The Seattle Times Company

[RawAlex]

Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Sudan and Yemen.

The porn business isn't suffering. Too bad they didn't take out Turkey and China, the fraud and spam rates would drop.