Mobile phone connections ‘not cut off’ during protest

MOBILE phone operators Telsim and North Cyprus Turkcell have denied claims that they “cut off the internet connection” during the mass anti-poverty protest march that took place in Lefkoşa last Friday.

Trade union leaders who spoke at the protest claimed that the mobile internet connections in the area where it took place had been deliberately “jammed” to prevent people sharing images and videos of the event.

However Telsim and North Cyprus Turkcell said in a joint statement that connection problems were due to “deficiencies” in the TRNC’s mobile phone systems.

“In any area where thousands of people gather, it is inevitable to experience deficiencies because of 3G technology, no matter how strong our infrastructure is,” the statement said. “It is impossible for the 3G network to handle a volume of this capacity.

“3G is no longer capable of handling the amount of data required by current and developing technologies. It can cause disruptions in internet service when 3G cannot meet the scale of the data demand in settings where there are a high number of users.”

The companies used the problems experienced by the protesters to highlight the need to upgrade the country’s mobile phone infrastructure.

“However, even when the number of users in busy settings and the amount of data transferred have increased, the internet connection is uninterrupted with 4.5G technology and the user volume is not affected like 3G is,” the statement continued.

“In this respect, providing the means for fibre optic infrastructure to replace the existing infrastructure with developing technologies and completing the tender for the transition to 4.5G are very important in terms of both increasing speed and stopping the disruptions caused by heavy user volume.

“In order to inform the public accurately, there was a problem accessing the network due to heavy user volume but there was absolutely no disruption in service.”