The spate of submarine cable problems that seem to have affected Vietnam in recent years prompted comments from Vu The Binh, secretary general of the Vietnam Internet Association, who said Vietnam needs at least two to three submarine cable lines to meet growing demand in the next five years.
The Vietnam News Agency (VNA) explained that four (two-fifths) of the submarine cable lines used by Vietnamese operators, including AAG, APG, AAE-1 and IA, are experiencing problems that are severely affecting the traffic on Vietnam's Internet connections - and have been since late January.
This is the first time so many incidents have occurred simultaneously. It's also unfortunate that it happened during the busy Lunar New Year holiday.
Operator Viettel has developed a re-routing plan to regulate traffic on remaining submarine and land cables and to purchase additional emergency capacity, while Vietnam Post and Telecommunications Group (VNPT) is also taking steps to ensure its consumers can connect to the international Internet.
These include sharing data loads between international lines that are still available, working with Facebook, TikTok and YouTube, and optimizing traffic on different cables. Social media platforms, financial, banking and insurance transactions, and mobile data connections are still operational, Vietcombank said. However, data-intensive activities such as online gaming or watching movies may be affected during peak hours given that four-fifths of the submarine cables are down.
Major domestic service providers are actively working with submarine cable systems and vessel operators to determine the cause of the problem, the location of the incident and a repair plan. Other smaller providers are trying to drive more traffic to land-based cables through China and Cambodia.
It may be rare for almost all submarine cable channels to have problems, but as we reported in 2021, it is not uncommon for submarine cables in general to fail, dating back as far as 2017. Binh therefore suggests that new cables are needed.
