Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) Chairman Major General (retd) Hafeezur Rehman stated that a problem in a submarine cable is causing disruption in internet services across Pakistan.
He made these comments at a meeting of the Standing Committee on Information Technology of the National Assembly, which was presided over by Syed Aminul Haque.
Omar Ayub, the head of the opposition, IT Minister Shaza Fatima, and other members attended the committee meeting. The purpose of the meeting was to talk about problems with social media access and widespread internet outages.
The chairman of the PTA was called in to give a thorough update on the circumstances.
Rehman clarified that Pakistan’s internet is down due to a malfunction in one of the underwater cables. Pakistan is connected to the rest of the world by seven fiber optic lines, one of which is now offline.
According to the cable consortium, repairs have to be finished by August 27,” he stated.
“This cable carries 7.5 terabytes of data, and its outage has severely impacted internet services, particularly for those who use VPNs,” he said.
He continued by saying that the circumstance has caused local internet services to slow down, particularly for those who utilize VPNs.
Committee members questioned the PTA chairman about why VPNs are now required for users as they continued to discuss the internet interruptions.
Rehman clarified that a greater dependence on VPNs occurs during such disruptions since they provide access to some data that is not available on local content delivery networks (CDNs).
