Mar 19, 2020 12:30:00

Cloudflare publishes 'How Internet traffic has changed due to the new coronavirus?'

In countries and regions where the spread of the new coronavirus infection (COVID-19) is expanding, there is a growing movement to avoid unnecessary urgent outings, and in some places attempts to block the entire area and prevent the spread of infection Has also been implemented. Meanwhile, the demand for the Internet to contact the outside and seek entertainment is said to be increasing, and Cloudflare , which provides a content delivery network and a distributed DNS server , said, `` Due to the influence of the new coronavirus, How has Internet traffic changed? '

On the shoulders of giants: recent changes in Internet traffic
https://blog.cloudflare.com/on-the-shoulders-of-giants-recent-changes-in-internet-traffic/

In a blog post, Cloudflare staff Louis Poinsignon noted that the Internet has become the primary means of contacting friends and family as many cities implement blockades and emergency measures. . He also noted that the number of attempts to perform remote work at companies around the world is increasing rapidly, and changes such as increases in traffic from home broadband networks and decreases in traffic from universities and businesses. It is appearing.

Large changes in traffic are not always unusual. Global sports events such as the Olympics and World Cup, cultural events such as giant music festivals, and even the Islamic Ramadan (fasting) often change traffic. 'The Internet was built to handle an ever-changing environment. In fact, the Internet was designed, created, tested, and debugged to handle changing load patterns,' points out Poinsignon. .

Even at the time of writing the article, which is undergoing major changes around the world due to the new coronavirus infection, Cloudflare's network operating center seems to be fully operational, and the traffic pattern changing in more than 200 cities Poinsignon commented that he was monitoring. A blog post explains, with graphs, how traffic has changed over the past few weeks due to the spread of the new coronavirus infection.

The United States

declared a national emergency on March 13, 2020 (Friday), and with the response to the new coronavirus, has enabled up to 5 trillion yen to be dispatched. Immediately after the announcement of the national emergency, traffic at US data centers increased by 20% compared to normal times. In the graph below, the gray line shows traffic up to the previous day and the red line shows traffic on the 13th. The traffic on the 13th surged at night, indicating that many people had access to the Internet and were watching President Trump's Declaration of State of Emergency.

In addition, the Dutch government has declared the closure of non-essential businesses at 17:30 local time on March 15 (Sunday) and 16:30

UTC . Looking at the graph below, it can be seen that the traffic on the 15th indicated by the red line sharply decreases after 16 o'clock of Coordinated Universal Time compared to the normal traffic shown in gray. I can return.

Also, French President

Emmanuel Macron gave a nationwide TV speech on the new coronavirus infection at 20:00 local time on Thursday, March 12 and Monday, March 16 at 19:00 UTC. Looking at the traffic on the 12th shown in pink and the traffic on the 16th shown in red, it can be seen that the traffic dropped sharply around 19 o'clock UTC when the national announcement was made, and then suddenly jumped up .

In Italy, daily Internet traffic has increased by 20-40% since Monday, March 9, when blockade measures were expanded nationwide .

As measures against the new type of coronavirus infection, universities close

schools , close schools, and switch to online classes, etc., have been implemented, but the traffic from the universities has decreased significantly. Looking at the graph below, you can see that the 16-day trific indicated by the red line has dropped to the same level as the weekend compared to the normal traffic indicated by the gray line . Many schools closed on Saturday, the 14th, which seemed to be the result.

Looking at the traffic of Internet exchanges that interconnect Internet service providers and Internet data centers , we can see that traffic has increased sharply since March 2020.

Looking at the traffic in London, the traffic fluctuated at a substantially constant cycle from February 15 to March 8, but the traffic generally increased from around March 9.

Below is a graph showing traffic fluctuations in Milan, Italy, where the blockade has been implemented. Traffic has increased by nearly 40% since the blockade began on March 9.

Looking at the traffic in Hong Kong, it can be seen that the traffic has increased sharply following the blockade started in Hubei Province, China on January 23.

'The emergence of the new coronavirus infection has a considerable impact on Internet services and our lives. It is difficult to accurately quantify the increase in traffic, but local and governmental We have observed a 10-40% increase in traffic as a result of this response. ' He noted that individual apps and web services could be shut down due to delays in development and difficulties associated with blockades, but that the core of the Internet would be robust and that the Internet itself would not be unavailable.