As floodwater continues to drain out of upper Sindh, cutting and damaging fiber-optic connections, further internet outages are anticipated in the coming days.
In a technical report delivered on Wednesday to the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecom by Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL), it was stated that the repeated internet outages were primarily caused by flood relief efforts in the Sukkur division, where fiber-optic cables were being damaged primarily by heavy machinery used to clear water in Sindh.
The government had asked technical reports from PTCL and Pakistan Telecom Authority after becoming aware of current instances of frequent internet outages (PTA).
The PTA said that building trenches at numerous locations to redirect or drain out floodwater was to blame for the several cuts in fiber-optic cables rather than any sabotage or criminal activities.
According to the PTCL report, several cuts in the districts of Ghotki, Khairpur, and Sukkur were to blame for the most recent internet service outages, which were reported on August 22 and 23. The Khairpur district’s tehsil Ranipur reported the most significant damage.
Syed Aminul Haque, the minister for IT and telecom, told local news media that the situation appeared to be serious and that additional events of this nature would occur in the near future.
“Due to extensive flooding, most of the pathways of underground cables have been submerged, as relief workers or locals were trying to divert floodwater by digging trenches on roads and footpaths,” he added.
“The ministry has directed PTCL to declare an emergency so that repair work could be initiated when any such incident is reported in the system, while the PTA is constantly monitoring the quality of service,” the minister said.
Around six terabytes of internet were used in Pakistan on a yearly basis, with most of the data coming through seven underwater internet cable systems, four of which are run by PTCL, two by Transworld Associates, and one new cable system that only just went live and is owned by a Chinese business. Nearly 80% of this internet traffic travels over the PTCL network, which spans more than 50,000 kilometres.
Only 70% of the 6.5 terabytes of data that may be sent across PTCL’s cable network are actually used, allowing for traffic to be diverted to alternative cables in the event of breakage.
Apart from its own retail internet service, a large number of internet service providers (ISPs), including the Storm Fibre and Nayatel, buy bulk internet from PTCL, and any damage to the company’s cable system results in internet service disruptions and degradation for customers of other ISPs too.