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MOBILE NETWORKS IN Ireland have experience as surge in voice and date traffic as more people rely on their operators to stay connected with family, friends and work.
While mobile networks are understood to have coped well with the extra usage, the mobile and broadband networks currently have less headroom to accommodate any further increases or potential spikes in demand over the coming weeks.
As a result, the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment working with the Commission for Communications Regulation (Comreg) yesterday signed regulations to provide mobile network operators flexibility to create extra capacity for mobile phone and broadband services.
Comreg said that due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the increased demand for connectivity poses challenges to operators and their networks.
“It is imperative that our mobile and wireless networks are able to carry extra voice and data traffic on their systems during this period.
Over the last number of days, ComReg has been engaging with the telecoms operators to ensure that the necessary measures and plans have been put in place by networks to manage and handle the surge in voice and data traffic,” it said.
Due to the “extraordinary situation”, ComReg has released extra capacity to allow mobile network operators to cater for the increase in traffic over their networks. It has also liberalised the use of the currently licensed 2.1 GHz band so that it can be used for 4G and other technologies, rather than just for 3G.
“This will be a temporary measure in response to the current situation,” said Comreg.
ComReg Commissioner, Jeremy Godfrey said it will continue to engage with industry and support telecoms companies to ensure that our telecoms networks continue to meet users’ needs “during these extremely challenging and evolving times.”
Minister for Communications, Climate Action and the Environment, Richard Bruton said:
“We are now more dependent on electronic communications networks and services than we have ever been before. It is imperative that communications networks and systems continue to work and cater for our changed social and economic needs during the Covid-19 situation.”
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Time to ramp up fibre and 5G roll-out. Broadband is an essential service like electricity and gas.
@DJ François: No it’s not. An essential service is something you can’t live without. I’m am fairly confident you won’t drop dead if your broadband router fails.
@DJ François: lol, yeah id hate to see what would happen if i couldn’t update my status on facebook or watch the latest Obama woke crap on Netflix. Somehow i think id survive.
@Roy Dowling: not really if ALL your work is done online as mine is!
@Tim O’Brien: woa you’re so edgy
@Lydia McLoughlin: How did you manage before broadband?.
@Roy Dowling: you can live without ESB, you can live without gas. Having them piped to your house is very handy mind you. So handy and embedded in our way of life we call them essential. Same with t’internet very handy to have. Essential to our way of life more than to life itself.
@john doe: Never claimed they were essential services either. They make our lives easier but that doesn’t make them essential. If you can live without it it’s not essential
@john doe: cool story bro.
@Roy Dowling: why don’t you get rid of that suit also and go back to living like a caveman? Since everything is non essential
@Who cares?: My car makes my life easier, gets me from my front door to my job, it gets me to places a lot quicker than public transport or walking can, it gets me to my destination dry and warm in the winter months. Would you consider my car to be essentail to my life of just convenience to make it easier?
@Tim O’Brien: your a bonanza for millennial buzzword bingo
@DJ François: not everyone Is using it to just read the journal or update Facebook. The economy would fall apart in the morning without the internet.
USD 3 billion in revenue.
I’d say connecting with loved ones on PornHub more like
@Sharp Elsi Mate: whatever you’re into!!
There will be people who have always had terrible broadband and coverage wondering why this couldn’t happen before now. Access is so essential, especially for small businesses… a bit shocked to find out we have capacity we’re not using, though I admit I know nothing about what ComReg does.
@Robin A Richardson: comreg commoditised the bandwidth. Networks will only lease what they need to as its very expensive.
@Robin A Richardson: well I for one have noticed a significant decrease in speeds since this lockdown
@Who cares?:
Without connectivity, devices and data centres this would be a very different experience.
@Motherofthree: Very true
@Motherofthree: Queue the post apocalypse data centre building boom ….
I see an article coming extolling the virtues of 5G
I don’t get the need for increased broadband. When we were all in our offices we were connected but not at home. So now it’s the opposite. Surely there’s little difference
@The Culk: generally, offices are in places that have enough broadband to carry a business and quite a lot of homes do not.
Giving out extra wireless licences will enable carriers to both cope with extra rural usage and also bring better quality broadband to rural areas
@The Culk: At work it’s mainly data that’s flowing through networks which uses less bandwidth,now we are all using facetime and other voice generated apps and for much longer periods of time,hence bandwidth near capacity of network allowance.Companies pay for certain amt of bandwidth at relatively high price so no point to buy more than was needed.
:@The Culk: don’t know what you do, but eh..it’s pretty obvious
if you’re working remotely, you more than likely have to connect to your office machine (which effectively streaming video of your remote machine to yours) => extra network usage.
Connected in both places
Similarly, people having video and audio conference calls instead of face to face meetings and streaming Netflix while putting themselves on mute on those calls
Now you get it?!
@Jazz Buckler: network suppliers have been found out they have plenty of band with which they hold back from end users until they ask for extra payments to speed up the broadband. The secret is now out. Everyone should demand a faster service at no extra cost
@The Culk: do the kids/students at home from school/college not use Internet to access school work
@The Culk: do the kids/students at home from school/college not use Internet to access school work.
@The Culk: Most offices are in towns & cities with good cable broadband services. Now a lot are working in more rural areas and depending on wireless services, or in the case of cable connection the exchange can be far away from the home, both of which can cause problems at peak usage times.
@The Culk: cos Netflix
@Peter Byrne: this is not how it works at all
Do not tell Gemma
Let’s hope Virgin’s much touted broadband is up to the task, imagine a loss of wi-fi on top of all this – mayhem!
@Cosmological: nope. Speeds and ping varying drastically now and outages several times during the day which must be due to heavy demand because prior to this crisis it was perfect and very fast .
@Cosmological: Just tested my VirginMedia broadband (12.51 PM) using Ookla and I’m getting 305Mb download and 34Mb upload. The quoted max I should get is 360Mb download and 36Mb upload so I think VirginMedia are doing a fine job.
@John Hagin Meade: virgin bb was always reliable especially if you don’t connect via wifi but cable to the router. I’m paying for 500 and that os what i get
Not an essential service? Hospitals need mobile and broadband during the crises. From contact tracing to providing online medical clinics. Our telecoms workers have been working flat out during this crisis to keep everyone connected and prioritising traffic for hospitals and other essential services.
Stop 5g until it is tested. Non ionizing radiation has proven to be harmful to humans, plants and insects. FACT
Operators aren’t going to go near their networks and change things when they have a big load on it. Radio frequency planning and reuse is a lot of work.
The only thing this will do is speed up 5G rollout here.
No mention of the lack of universal coverage for high speed broadband. Hell, we’re in Bray unable to get more than 16MB, except for Virgin and they’re too expensive.
ComReg seem to live in the pockets of the providers ~ They can give the providers sweetheart deals on bandwith but can do nothing about promised speeds and inflated prices by Irish providers for some obscure reason ~~ Maybe its because the customer is the least important part of ComRegs agenda since it’s inception !
have your say