Weekly Wrap: Should we expect more resilience from mobile operators?

Spain and parts of Portugal experienced a historic electricity blackout this week. Public transport, including metro lines, was halted and required evacuation. Traffic lights stopped working, hospitals suspended routine operations, schools and workplaces closed, and the Spanish Senate suspended parliamentary activity. And of course, there was a severe telecommunications outage.

Industry analyst Luke Kehoe sketched a devastating picture for mobile operators as events unfolded. He said median mobile downloads in Spain were as low as 14.64 Mbps on the day of the outage, down more than 73% from the previous day.  The minimum performance threshold of 5 Mbps download and 1 Mbps upload collapsed from a baseline of ~95% at 9:00 CET to ~50% by 12:00 CET, falling as low as 40% by 15:00.

This was a major wake-up call on the importance of strengthening infrastructure and making telecom networks more resilient. What can guarantee this resilience? Does the industry need a framework that sees telecoms as critical infrastructure rather than a commercial service? What can satellite offer to strengthen that resilience? When terrestrial infrastructure is compromised—fibre, mobile, even core Internet exchanges – can satellite connectivity offer a way out? It certainly cuts through geographical constraints and can provide critical continuity, as it did during last year’s LA wildfires.

The European Commission’s forthcoming Digital Networks Act is expected to emphasise the need for resilient and secure digital networks within the EU, focusing on investment and possibly new regulatory frameworks. This outage could pave the way for policymakers to demand more resilience from operators. At PolicyTracker, we’re keeping a close eye on potential regulatory changes.

Here’s what we’ve covered this week:

• Mexico’s attempts to replace its telecoms regulator have hit a speed bump, as the country’s Senate has delayed the new telecom law following criticism.
• As interest in THz spectrum begins to fade, we explore why these ultra-high frequencies are unlikely to play a role in 6G.
• Remember when concerns about altimeters halted flight traffic in the US? A new European Commission roadmap hopes to avoid similar issues in Europe.
• Sweden’s pay TV broadcaster has switched off its digital terrestrial TV (DTT) channels. We asked the regulator PTS what it plans to do with the vacant spectrum.
• The US is looking to create a “backup” for GPS technology. It argues that current technology is unsafe and is exploring new alternatives.