The London Internet Exchange (LINX) has recorded a new peak in internet usage, which comes just over a year since the mass shift to remote working began and started a new era of increased network reliance.
LINX, an internet exchange point (IXP) with headquarters in London Docklands’ Telehouse, was founded in 1994 as a way of saving time and costs involved in routing data from UK to US internet exchanges. Originally involving just two ISPs, it now counts 965 members, including ISPs and mobile operators from the UK and abroad.
The organisation has now announced that earlier this month, it recorded a new total maximum traffic peak of over 6Tbps, with its primary LAN in London reaching 5.17Tbps alone. The peak occurred on the evening of Tuesday, 6 April, between 8:35 and 8:40 pm.
Although the main cause behind the surge in network traffic has not been identified, LINX has attributed the spike to the online streaming of football games being transmitted that evening. The traffic substantially dropped when the two games went into half-time at around 8:45 that evening.
Another potential contribution to the surge could be due to online gaming updates being released that day, intensified by the thousands of office workers confined to their homes as the UK remains under lockdown restrictions.
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LINX CCO Jennifer Holmes described the past 13 months as “demanding”. However, she added that the organisation had been able to keep up with capacity demands caused by the increased reliance on internet networks for communication and collaboration purposes, including video conferencing.
“This time last year we were quickly adjusting to the new virtual set up as lockdown hit. We saw the first of many traffic peaks, and we have continued to respond and manage the demand from our members for increased capacity,” said Holmes.
“To hit 6Tbps across our network is really satisfying, and considering the amount of traffic which also passes across our Private Interconnect service, this is a huge increase from this time last year,” she added.
