Myanmar poll raises internet usage
Play
Yangon - Internet usage in Myanmar rose by 300 per cent on November 8 when the nation hosted the general election, according to the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology.
Net users expressed concern about slow connections during the election period. Although the connection was slow in some areas, the overall connection speed was not notably slow, the ministry said.
“We were concerned about the connection before the election period,” said Deputy Minister Thaung Tin. He said that in 2010, the servers were attacked and the Internet was down.
“We expected Internet use to rise two or three times above the normal rate during the election period. We worked with Myanma Post and Telecommunication (MPT) to prepare for it in advance. We made sure not to lose connection in the period, as it could have led to inaccurate assumptions. Since we removed Internet censorship, there has been no blockade.”
At present, MPT offers backbone bandwidth of about 50GB in total. Ooredoo and Telenor have 30GB and 20GB bandwidths, respectively.
