Looks like our Internet service will be slow over the next 2 weeks since there are some “circuits fault” on Southeast Asia – Middle East – Western Europe 4 (SMW4) submarine cable network between Palermo (Southern Italy) and Alexandria (Northern Egypt) linking Malaysia to Europe.
(SMW4 submarine cable network)The SMW4 submarine cable network has landing points in 15 countries- Singapore, Malaysia(Melaka), Thailand, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Egypt, Italy, Tunisia, Algeria and France.
The cable is approximately 18,800 kilometres long, and provides the primary Internet backbone between South East Asia, the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East and Europe, according to Wikipedia.
However, you will only experience a slow internet connection if you are surfing a website that is hosted in Europe or countries close to it.
In December 2006, the SEA-ME-WE 3 optical submarine telecommunications cable and APCN2 (Asia Pacific Cable Network 2) was hit by earthquake that disrupted communications across east Asia.
This undersea cable project that is lead by TM is considered safe from “earthquakes” and “tsunamis” and it should be ready by early next year. The Asia-America Gateway, will connect the U.S. West Coast with Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Guam and Hawaii, as well as offer “seamless interconnection” for those locations with Europe, Africa and Australia.
Statement from TM
Telekom Malaysia Berhad (TM) wishes to announce that there is a disruption of its Internet services due to circuits fault on Southeast Asia – Middle East – Western Europe 4 (SMW4) submarine cable network between Palermo (Southern Italy) and Alexandria (Northern Egypt) linking Malaysia to Europe.
Due to this, customers using Internet services may now experience slow browsing while accessing websites hosted in Europe. In addition, customers using other IP services such as Virtual Private Network (VPN) and other critical business applications linked to Europe may also experience some service degradation.
To alleviate the problem, some of the links have been rerouted to alternate routes to ease the congestion.
Restoration works on the affected cables are already in progress. However, in the restoration process, traffic to Northern America may experience minor degradation while traffic to other countries is not affected. TM expects the complete recovery of its services by December 31, 2008. TM will make further announcements on the progress of the restoration works.
TM wishes to assure its customers that it is undertaking all necessary measures to restore communications services for its customers as soon as possible.
Customers can call TM at 100 and select “Internet Services” or e-mail us at [email protected] for any Internet related problems.
