An undersea cable system — Illustrative photo The Verge

HÀ NỘI — The problems found in Branch S1I of the America Asia Gateway (AAG) undersea cable have been fixed, restoring the internet data connection between Việt Nam and Hong Kong (China), Department of Telecommunications under the Ministry of Information and Communications announced on Wednesday.

AAG is one of the five international undersea cables taking up most of the internet connection capacity from Việt Nam to the world. All the five in turn fell into problems last year and the first months of this year.

Having a length of 20,191km, the AAG directly connects Southeast Asia with the US. Put into operation in November 2009, it passes through Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Việt Nam, Brunei, Hong Kong (China), the Philippines, and the US.

Early this month, the repair of two international undersea cables – IA and SMW3 – have been completed. The problem that occurred at the end of November 2022 on Segment S1H of Line AAE-1 has been completely fixed, so the data transmission on the route was restored on May 20.

Up to now, only AAG's undersea cable branches to Singapore and the APG route are still experiencing errors. It is expected that the problem on Branches S1B, S1D, and S1G of Line AAG will be fixed within this month. The repair on the APG is expected to be completed next month.

According to the Department of Telecommunications, the Ministry of Information and Communications will urge and guide telecommunications businesses to study and build four to six new undersea cable lines following the draft planning on information and communications infrastructure in the period 2021-30 to meet demand.

It is expected that in this year and early 2024, businesses will put into use two more sea cable lines, ADC and SJC2, with a landing point located in the central province of Bình Định. — VNS