MCIT Discusses Internet Outage Crisis: Official Source

An official source in Information and Communication Technology Ministry (MCIT) has elaborated to Amwal Al Ghad that MCIT has formed an operating room operations to discuss the internet interruption crisis which Egypt is witnessing now due to the outage of submarine cables in the Mediterranean Sea.

The source added that the operating room, which includes Telecom Egypt TE, the National Telecommunication Regulatory Authority (NTRA) and internet firms, seeks to monitor the effect size and ways of treatment.

Moreover, the source has emphasized that the priority now is for the financial sectors such as Egyptian Stock Exchange (EGX), banks, commercial sectors and firms, pointing out that the operating room reviews the available alternative paths to transfer the data through it.

Furthermore, Waseem Arsany, CEO Of LinkdotNet, the Leading Internet Services Provider, said the outage of submarine cables on Wednesday may affect the internet services throughout the country, pointing out that internet connection will be restored in Cairo, Alexandria and governorates having high population density.

Arsany added to Amwal Al Ghad that the outage which has happened today affected the alternative paths of cables provided by Telecom Egypt (TE) to repair the main cable (etnorth) last Friday.

He noted that internet firms are seeking now to find solutions for the outage of the main and alternative cables within this week, explaining that the current plan is to distribute loads on all governorates.