African internet outage was caused by subsea cable break

#Africa
African internet outage was caused by subsea cable break

Loveworld / 1 hour

April 3, 2024

2 min read

West African data centre and connectivity provider MainOne alsom added on Friday that an internet outage that hit West and Central Africa earlier this week was caused by a break in its submarine cable system. MainOne, which is owned by data center operator Equinix, said that an “external incident” resulted in a cut to its cable system in the Atlantic Ocean, offshore Ivory Coast along the coast of West Africa. It ruled out human activity as a cause. Their preliminary analysis would suggest some form of seismic activity on the seabed resulted in a break to the cable.
Major internet disruption has been reported in various countries across Africa. Widespread outages were reported last Thursday in countries including South Africa, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Benin, Ghana and Burkina Faso. Cloudflare Radar, which provides information on internet connections says there seems to be a pattern in the timing of the disruptions, impacting from the north to the south of Africa. The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), which regulates the telecoms industry, said the outage was caused by damage to international undersea cables running along the West African coastline. The cuts probably occurred somewhere in Ivory Coast and Senegal, with an attendant disruption in Portugal.
Millions lost internet service after three cables in the Red Sea were damaged. Houthi rebels deny targeting the cables, but their missile attack on a cargo ship, left adrift for months, is likely to blame. The Red Sea is a key route for sending internet traffic between the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Europe via undersea cables, which transport 99 per cent of intercontinental data. Intercontinental undersea cables transmit more than $10tn in financial transactions daily. Houthi strikes in the Red Sea have damaged these cables, forcing tech companies to reroute internet traffic. Over 90 percent of all Europe-Asia traffic flows through cables in the Red Sea. The Houthis have denied deliberately targeting undersea cables, while Yemeni officials have said they are in daily contact with international submarine companies in the Red Sea and will provide support to repair any damage.