Internet exchange for Nigeria

Speaking at the inauguration of the network operating centre for the facility in Umuahia, Abia State on Saturday, the chairman of Interstella Communications, Obi Thompson, said the facility would also help provide a secured means of addressing cyber crime in Nigeria and create better management for internet traffic.

He said currently cyber crime thrives in Nigeria because of the unguarded nature of the country's internet topology that allows people to get access from just anywhere in the world. This model, he noted, besides the security risk involved, also creates a high cost for users access as access is based on third parties.

Thompson explained that what Interstella has done by the building of the new gateway "is to assert Nigeria's cyber sovereignty by going through the international peering point from which all countries draw circuits without passing through any intermediaries."

He added that this would ensure Nigeria got direct access to the major sources for internet traffic and thereby have the means to bring down the cost of internet bandwidth and ensure better access to better telecoms services including internet protocol telephony.

Interstella, he said can drive down the cost of 1Mbps of bandwidth from the current price of about $20,000 to $5,000 with the new facility, adding that this created a compelling need for the facility to be utilised.

Asked about the existence of another Internet exchange, which is backed by the Nigerian Communications Commission, Thompson said this was true but noted that its establishment infringed on Interstella's licence which allowed it to build Internet Exchange points across Nigeria with exclusivity.

He said the matter had gone to court but a resolution of it was being discussed among various stakeholders following the intervention of the National Security Adviser. He said the Interstella exchange point had been approved by the federal government to be a public private partnership, going by the nature of the licence granted to Interstella and the practice among many countries that allows for only one internet exchange point to operate locally.

Besides, the exchange services, Thompson said that the firm had internet service provider licence but said it would exercise restraint in offering this service and would rather focus on building infrastructure to help IP telephony growth in Nigeria.

At a facility tour organised for journalists, he demonstrated IP telephony services which his firm would be offering saying this would help drive down the cost of telephony services in Nigeria.

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