Vietnam's undersea cable immediately malfunctions after repairs

An Internet service provider said the reparation of the S7 section on the Asia-Pacific Gateway (APG) undersea cable, which malfunctioned in March, was completed on Thursday as planned, restoring a vital Internet connection between Vietnam and the outside world through APG routes to Hong Kong and Japan.

However, the S1.7 section on the cable, which connects with Singapore, is now malfunctioning, resulting in the cable’s data flow operating at only half capacity, according to the provider.

The APG cable’s management unit has not informed its partners about the cause of the malfunction, and no repair timeline has been released.

Other Internet service providers said the problem would prevent Vietnam’s international Internet connection from returning to normal yet.

Along with a group of international businesses, four Vietnamese companies currently hold investments in the 10,400-km APG cable: FPT, VNPT, Viettel and CMC. With a maximum bandwidth of 54 Tb per second, the cable has the largest data capacity of all undersea cables in Asia.

Vietnam currently has five undersea cables in operation. In February, all five cables encountered issues at the same time. Internet service providers reported to the Vietnam Telecommunications Authority in May that four of the five cables, excepting APG, had been repaired and were operating normally.