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By Lê Nguyễn Bảo Hương
In the first month of 2023, the Intra-Asia and Asia-Pacific Gateway submarine cables are reported to be broken. This is causing a dramatic deterioration in internet quality for users in Southeast Asia and Vietnam in particular.
At the end of last year, two fiber optic cables also had problems and were not resolved. For the first time, four of the five submarine cables connecting Vietnamese users to the international community have been damaged.
Cable disruption is a chronic problem in Vietnam since 2017. In a country where 74% of the population needs online connectivity, not being able to have reliable and available internet access is detrimental to everyday users, businesses and government activities. I urge Internet service providers (ISPs) in Vietnam and relevant international stakeholders to work together to (1) repair the broken cables in a timely manner and (2) diversify Vietnam’s Internet infrastructure by expanding its terrestrial cable network.
The internet is physical
Yes, the internet is a physical thing. The emails we send, the movies we stream, and the data we work with every day are sent over fiber optic cables. Most lay in the ocean and stretch across continents.
The cables are made of glass or plastic – materials that prioritize the transfer of information the speed of light. Thin as human hair, these cables are responsible for communication 99% of international data.
The cables are coated in a plastic tube to protect them from water and are laid by ships across the ocean floor. Currently there are 750,000 miles or 552 submarine cables in the world.
In Vietnam alone, five dedicated submarine cables connect the country to regional and international networks: Intra-Asia (IA), Asia-Pacific Gateway (APG), Asia-America Gateway (AAG), Asia-Africa-Europe 1 (AAE-1 ), Southeast Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 3 (SMW 3). Four out of five are broken. The only functioning SMW3 is an old line and is about to be liquidated.
These cable networks are jointly operated by multinational telecommunications conglomerates and/or private companies. Vietnam Post and Telecommunications Group (VNPT), a state-owned company, oversees the AAG and APG, which have direct landing bases in three provinces in Vietnam. Viettel, a private telecom company and the largest network of mobile operators in the country, has co-invested in the AAE-1. These consortia make repair planning difficult as there are many stakeholders involved in the management of submarine internet cables.
A screenshot of the Southeast Asia submarine cable map. Map provided by TeleGeography. https://www.submarinecablemap.com/
Broken cables, broken connections
Despite being underwater, internet cables are susceptible to physical damage. More than 100 incidents occur each year due to human activities and environmental impacts. Ships’ anchoring and fishing activities are responsible for 65-75% of all cable failures, according to the International Cable Protection Committee. Natural disastersespecially in a country prone to tropical storms like Vietnam, contribute to other instances of internet outages.
Defective cables cause delays in internet connections, loss of international data and disruption of business operations. With the recent damage to the Intra-Asia line, online information from Vietnam to Singapore has been completely suspended. Many Vietnamese users cannot access their bank accounts, the stock markets and insurance information.
Frustrations are also growing among small business owners. Thanh Trung, who runs an online store, was annoyed by the slow internet. “I planned to start the new year off right with dozens of orders to process, but an hour went by and I still couldn’t access the admin page. It means orders have been delayed and my customers are still waiting.” he said. The e-commerce sector is expected to reach worth $23 billion by 2025. Thanh Trung represents a growing number of e-commerce business owners in Vietnam who depend on reliable and available internet connections for their livelihoods.
Repair and diversify
The Vietnamese government, private telecom companies and relevant international stakeholders should not only repair the broken cables in a timely manner, but also invest in long-term solutions to diversify Internet resources for Vietnamese users.
The Intra-Asia line is expected to be repaired in March 2023, APG in April. AAG and AAE-1 are not scheduled for repair. That means Vietnamese users are expected to experience internet slowdowns for at least another month. This is simply unacceptable for a country where 74% of the population needs online connectivity.
APG and AAG are owned by the state telecom company. The Vietnamese government has the political and financial clout to expedite the repair of the faulty cables. It may also accelerate the launch of two planned cable lines, the Southeast Asia-Japan 2 (SJC-2) and the Asia Direct cable (ADC), to add more functioning submarine lines for Vietnamese users. Meanwhile, private ISPs are collaborating with international partners Meta, Tiktok and Youtube restore partial internet capacity.
Meta and Google in particular could benefit greatly from investing more submarine cable lines in Southeast Asia. Vietnam is a strong and growing market for these giant technology companies. The population reacts extremely technically, with 20 million Vietnamese on Facebook every day Google dominates 95% of the Vietnamese search engine market share. To capitalize on this growing enthusiasm for using social networks, technology companies should build their own cable service in Vietnam, such as Google did it in Chile And Meta in Africa.
Due to the fragile nature of submarine cable lines, Vietnam needs to diversify its internet resources. Extending terrestrial cables offers an alternative solution to the current subsea network.
Vietnam’s terrestrial fiber optic network should model on the model of the Asian Highway Network and the Pan-Asian Railway Project. Both infrastructures have been in operation for decades and play an important role in connecting Vietnam with its northern and western neighbours. By following the blueprints of these two projects, the terrestrial fiber optic network can open up another path – digital this time – between Southeast, East and South Asia.
Terrabit, an international telecommunications infrastructure consultancy, expects that a pan-Asian terrestrial fiber optic network will be a competitive option for submarine cables, provide more cost-effective connectivity for Internet users, and promote economic cooperation in the ASEAN-9 region.
Timely repair and diversification of internet cable networks are necessary to keep Vietnamese users up to date with the rest of the world. Improving the internet infrastructure should be a priority. Not only will a diverse and extensive Internet service network be beneficial to Vietnam’s digital economy, it will also make the country a regional one digital hub in the next decade, an ambitious goal set by the Ministry of Information and Communication.
About the author:
Born in Vietnam, Bảo Hương is currently a first-year master’s candidate in the Foreign Service program at Georgetown University. She focuses on development and sustainability issues in Southeast Asia. Before coming to Georgetown, she worked as a policy analyst in the clean energy transition industry in San Diego. Bảo Hương can be reached via email huongvanessale@gmail.com or linkedin.com/in/huong-vanessa-le/.
