Thailand Internet Problems

[rxpharm]

For those living in Thailand - possible problems with your internet service - from Bangkok Post, Dec. 27.

Internet slowdown to be a pain for at least three weeks
Taiwan quake cripples Thai Internet

BANGKOK: -- Telecommunications across Asia have been severely disrupted because of damage to undersea cables caused by Tuesday's earthquake near Taiwan.

Banks and businesses in Taiwan, South Korea, China and Japan reported telephone and internet problems.

In Thailand, Internet access slowed to a crawl, with up to 90 per cent of e-mail and web access impossible. There was no word from CAT Telecom, the government monopoly which supplies all Internet service to Thailand.

Taiwan's largest telephone company, Chunghwa Telecom Co, said damage to an undersea cable had disrupted 98% of Taiwan's communications with Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Hong Kong.

Repairs could take three weeks, Vice-General Manager Lin Jen-hung said, but quality would improve daily.

Telecommunications companies in Hong Kong, Japan and China also reported problems.

China's biggest telecoms provider, China Telecommunications Group, said that communications cables to the US and to Europe had been damaged.

"Internet connections have been seriously affected, and phone links and dedicated business lines have also been affected to some degree," it said.

Repairing the cables harmed by Tuesday's 6.7-magnitude quake could take three weeks but "quality will improve day by day," said Lin Jen-hung, vice general manager of Chunghwa Telecom Co., Taiwan's largest phone company.

The company said damage to a cable off Taiwan's southern coast has interrupted 98 percent of Taiwan's communications capacity with Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Hong Kong.

The damaged lines knocked out Internet service for some Hong Kong customers, who were unable to access Web sites in parts of Asia and the U.S.

Hong Kong telephone company PCCW Ltd., which also provides Internet service, said several undersea data cables were damaged in the quake.

"Data traffic to Taiwan, Korea, Japan and the United States are affected," PCCW said in a statement.

The company also warned customers that they may experience congestion for several days on the Internet because of an upsurge in use as people surf the Web for more information about the quake.

Financial traders in Hong Kong _ one of Asia's biggest business capitals _ complained they lost their connection to Bloomberg LP, a key provider of news and data about stock markets. Bloomberg declined to immediately comment on the outage.

Internet access has been cut or has become extremely slow in Beijing, said an official from China Netcom, China's No. 2 phone company.

The official, who would not give his name, said the cause was thought to be the earthquake, but he had not further details.

Businesses in various parts of the city also said they were experiencing Internet access problems.

CCTV, the state-run television network, said the earthquake had damaged undersea communications cables from China to the United States and from Asia to Europe.

It said China Telecom Corp., China's biggest phone company, was contacting counterparts in the United States and Europe about using satellites to make up for the shortfall.

KDDI Corp., Japan's major carrier for international calls, said Thursday that its fixed-line telephone service has been intermittently affected following the quake.

KDDI spokesman Haruhiko Maeda said that the quake damaged several undersea communication cables in southern Taiwan shared among international communication companies.

He said that customers are having trouble making calls to India and the Middle East, which are usually routed through cables near Taiwan. Maeda said the company is rerouting calls to go through the U.S. and Europe and the company does not know how long it will take to repair the cables.

Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications said that international roaming service provided by Japan's major three telecommunications _ NTT DoCoMO, KDDI, and Softbank, has been affected. Ministry official Akira Yamanaka said that some customers were unable to make calls using their mobile phones in countries including Taiwan.

The quake, which hit offshore from the town of Hengchun near Taiwan's southern tip, came on the second anniversary of the tsunami that killed more than 200,000 lives in southern Asia.

Tuesday's quake was felt throughout Taiwan. It shook buildings and knocked objects off the shelves in the capital, Taipei, in the northern part of the island. Two members of one family were killed Tuesday in Hengchun when their four-story home collapsed. The quake injured 42 people, three homes collapsed and 12 fires broke out, the National Fire Agency said.

--Bangkok Post 2006-12-27

[stogie bear]

Anyone in Thailand notice anything?

I didn't think it could get slower, actually!

[rxpharm]

More details in Yahoo News Story:



by Marc Carnegie 2 hours, 41 minutes ago

HONG KONG (AFP) - Internet and phone services have been disrupted across much of Asia after an earthquake damaged undersea cables, leaving one of the world's most tech-savvy regions in a virtual blackout.
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From frustrated traders seeking in vain for stock quotes to anxious newshounds accustomed to round-the-clock updates on world events, millions of people from China to Japan to Australia were affected Wednesday.

The disruption was widespread, hitting China, Japan,
South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Hong Kong and elsewhere, with knock-on effects as far away as Australia for companies whose Internet is routed through affected areas.

There was no chaos on the stock exchanges or any of the other doomsday scenarios, but reports that services could be down for weeks were dramatic enough.

South Korea's information and communication ministry said all six undersea fibreoptic cables off Taiwan were hit, causing major disruption. All services, except for exclusive business lines, returned to normal shortly afterwards as they were switched to other systems.

But officials could not put a timeframe on when business lines would be fixed. "It is not a matter of days," said Hong Seoung-Yong, a ministry official handling the problem. "It will take longer than that to repair the damaged lines."

A 7.1-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Taiwan on Tuesday night, which was followed by several smaller quakes in the region, apparently damaged the vast network of underwater cables that enables modern communication.

"The Internet capacity in Taiwan is about 40 percent now, so the service is jammed," said a spokesman for Chunghwa Telecom, Taiwan's largest phone company.

In China, web users in cities as far apart as Beijing in the north and Chongqing in the southwest reported difficulties accessing overseas websites, state media reported.

The earthquake cut at least six undersea cables owned by China Telecom, one of the country's largest telecomunications and broadband providers, affecting Internet links with America, Europe and other regions, Xinhua news agency quoted the company as saying.

China Mobile, another top Chinese telecom provider, also reported problems.

Xinhua said repair work was likely to be hampered by aftershocks expected to continue for up to a week.

Phone services in some countries were also disrupted, in particular for calls to the United States.

"Several undersea data cables were damaged," said a spokesman for PCCW, Hong Kong's biggest telecoms company.

Service providers quickly tried to redirect customers to the cables that had not been affected but the reduced capacity was no match for the normal workload of users, leaving an Internet service that was painfully slow or non-existent.

"It's a nightmare, basically, because we have no idea what is going on in the markets today," said Steve Rowles, an analyst with CFC Seymour in Hong Kong, who echoed others in saying that damage was limited due to year's end.

"It has happened on the right day as a lot of people are away for holidays, so there's low trading volumes," he said.

The Tokyo Stock Exchange, the world's largest bourse outside of New York, was functioning without problems, a spokesman said.

The Hong Kong stock exchange also said it was also working without problems, but after-hours crude trading in Singapore was affected as traders reported they could not access the New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex).

NTT Communications, the long-distance call business of Japan's largest telecom firm Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp., said 1,400 toll-free phone lines and 84 international lines used internally by companies were affected.

The crux of the trouble seemed to be in the underseas routes near Taiwan, which providers would try to bypass in favour of other routes through Europe, said a spokesman for Japanese telecoms firm KDDI Corp, Satoru Ito.

"If there is too much traffic on that route, it might get blocked up and further slow down Internet connections," Ito said.