Thirteen countries across Africa experienced Internet outages on Thursday due to damage to submarine fiber optic cables. Some countries, including Ghana and Nigeria, are still suffering from nationwide outages.
Multiple network providers reported Internet outages yesterday, and Cloudflare’s Radar tool, which monitors Internet usage patterns, detailed how the outage seemingly moved from the northern part of West Africa to South Africa. All 13 countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, South Africa, The Gambia, and Togo) reportedly suffered nationwide outages, with most seeing multiple networks hit.
I wonder what happened. Well, I mean, these undersea cable breaks are nearly always caused by a ship’s captain with innovative ideas about anchor usage, but there’s a tiny chance it could be something nefarious too – although with no apparent motive, I’d assume it’s just run of the mill incompetence like usual
