Massive Internet Outages Have Been Reported Across Africa
By KosovaPress
July 12, 2024
Massive internet outages were reported across Africa on Thursday, affecting businesses and communications, local media and internet observatory Netblocks reported.
Netblocks said in a post on X that live network data showed that Thursday's telecom outages in Africa had intensified.
The incident has a high impact on West Africa with significant reductions in connections across the continent, he said.
According to My Broadband, an ICT website in South Africa, the outage began around 12:30 on Thursday with some users reporting that they were unable to access the Internet or were unable to use several online services, including LinkedIn, Microsoft 365, Microsoft Teams, WhatsApp, X and Xbox.
“MyBroadband has learned that multiple breaks in submarine cables near Abidjan in Ivory Coast are causing outages. The West African Cable System (WACS), Coastal Africa to Europe (ACE) cables, MainOne and SAT3 cables are affected,” a report said.
Netblocks said Ivory Coast was severely affected, while Liberia, Benin, Ghana and Burkina Faso faced major incidents of disruption. South Africa, Lesotho and Nigeria had low disruptions, while Cameroon, Gabon and Namibia had medium disruptions.
A spokesman for Vodacom, one of South Africa's largest telecoms firms, said multiple failures of submarine cables between South Africa and Europe were affecting network providers, including Vodacom, according to a report by local site News24.
“This means that some customers are currently experiencing intermittent connectivity issues,” the spokesperson said. /AA
