The majority of Pakistan went offline when Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited’s (PTCL) internet stopped working earlier in the afternoon on Monday.
Initially, everyone thought that it was one of the usual hiccups that PTCL undergoes all the time, but soon they realised that they weren’t the only ones who were cut off from the internet. Ufone’s 3G stopped working as well at the same time and users were quick to guess that something had gone wrong all across the country.
ProPakistani started getting reports around 4 pm about the outage. Initially, like everyone else, we thought that the usual cable cuts were to blame, with services probably impacted in limited areas, but soon it was clear that the outage stretched throughout the country.
Not only consumers but ISPs that rely on PTCL’s backhaul also went offline. Ufone, a major PTCL customer and a sister concern, was severely impacted as well, as its 3G and SMS services went off-air across the country.
The PTCL responded to media queries and termed the reason behind its service outages as resulting from to multiple cable cuts. Media was quick to buy the theory and ran the news as per official PTCL sources.
It’s for sure not a media cut or fault: CEO of an ISP
However upon investigation, certain details came to light that threw the official version of events into doubt.
If it was the cable cut(s), then why were PTCL’s landline phones working or PTCL Smart TV for that matter? Add to that Ufone’s voice service (2G) as well, which was working normally.
Moreover, since PTCL’s backhaul is usually highly available and redundant all across, a cut in cable or even multiple cuts shouldn’t impact the entire country.
Industry experts, when we asked them, were not convinced with the cable cut theory. A CEO of an ISP, who wanted to remain unnamed, ruled out the possibility of a media cut. “It’s for sure not a media cut or fault”, he said.
Another top guy who deals with networks from Karachi was hesitant to accept that a cable cut could be the root cause of the PTCL outage. He said that these were not usual cable cuts if they were cable cuts at all. “These cuts were very special for sure; at the most unfortunate places that triggered a countrywide outage”
If it were indeed multiple cable cuts, then it’s a badly designed network: Pervez Iftikhar
He further explained that dual cuts often spill over into configuration issues at both the transport and network layer.
When asked if the outage could be due to software misconfiguration, Pervez Iftikhar, former CEO of USF Pakistan, said that he couldn’t rule out the chance.
Mr Parvez also stressed that cable cuts would have to be at a very “strategic” location to cause such aggravated problems in the network. “If it were indeed multiple cable cuts, then it’s a badly designed network”, he added.
Parvez Iftikhar also said that there is apparently no inter-operator cable swap in place or else this type of outage would never have occurred.
Not to mention, this country wide internet downtime from PTCL was first of its kind instance. There hasn’t been a similar past incident.
It is yet to be seen if this was a deliberate act or not!
Mr Imran Janjua, General Manager PR at PTCL, in response to our queries, said that PTCL’s network is designed for business continuity and high availability.
“However, due to abnormal cuts in our cables in different remote parts of the country, internet services were impacted which have been fully restored.”
Mr Janjua further said that a high-level investigation committee has been constituted to determine the root cause of the outage.
The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority is apparently also keeping an eye on the development. A PTA spokesperson, while speaking with ProPakistani, said that investigations are being conducted to ascertain the reasons behind the outage.
While it is too early to make a definitive claim, it is safe to assume that the investigation committee set up by the PTCL will definitely look into the possibility that the outage was a deliberate act.
Also, the committee must see that why the network wasn’t redundant enough to cope with multiple cable cuts.
We are assuming that this was a one-off thing, and actionable information with full-scale lessons will be learnt from the incident.
Pakistan, in any circumstances, is in no condition to bear country-wide outage for millions of customers, corporations, businesses, banks, exchanges, schools, universities and households again.
Courtesy ProPakistani