Expert: Autonomous System Number Will Boost Global Identity, Network Resilience

Emma Okonji

The Chief Executive Officer, Internet Xchange Point of Nigeria (IXPN), Mr. Mohammed Rudman has advised all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and large enterprises to acquire the Autonomous System Number (ASN) in order to have global visibility and local  network resilience that will help them serve their customers better.

Rudman gave the advice at a technology forum in Lagos while presenting a paper themed: ‘Internet Connectivity, Visibility And Network Resilience’.

He described Autonomous System Number (ASN) as a unique identifier that is assigned to a network that share a single and defined routing policy for easy network identification and resilience in a global tech space.

According to him, “ASN offers global identity, network resilience and flexibility that allow service providers to have multiple interfaces and be able to connect to multiple service providers. Without ASN, it will be extremely difficult for ISPs and large enterprises to connect to two or more service providers. The beauty of multiple connections is that service providers can easily switch to other networks and continue to offer resilient services without downtime, if there is service disruption like fibre cut on one network.”

So ASN gives service providers better network resilience, and it also enables global identity for the world to have access to different networks that are managed by local ISPs. It also offers opportunity for expansion to multiple locations because if you’re in one location and you’re using MTN, you can also be in another location while using Airtel. But without ASN, it will be extremely difficult to achieve, Rudman further said.

Emphasising the importance of network resilience with ASN, Rudman said if by chance there was a destruction caused by fibre cut, like what happened in 2024, the ISP would be able to route its customers to other networks, without the customers experiencing any form of downtime, since the ASN allows ISPs to connect to multiple operators.

Rudman also stressed the need for domestication of internet traffic generated in Nigeria, in order to encourage local hosting of data in the country.

“Local data gathering and storage have improved tremendously in Nigeria, considering how internet data was generated and accessed in the past years. In 2011, the internet traffic recorded was very minimal, and by 2015, it was only four gigabits per second. By 2020, it was only 200 gigabits. But from 2020 till date, Nigeria has grown by over 500 per cent in internet traffic. As of December last year, we’ve reached two terabits of traffic, which is really good for us as country,” Rudman said.

He is however worried that even with the current increase in internet traffic, the local content that Nigeria has is still not fully local because 70 per cent is coming from Google, and from people watching YouTube from TikTok.

“But the good thing about connectivity is that TikTok, Meta, Facebook, including Microsoft and Amazon, are all connected IXPN, which constitutes the 70 local per cent internet traffic in Nigeria. But the actual website of Nigerian newspapers combined are all being hosted outside Nigeria, even though the people that are browsing those sites are in Nigeria. So a substantial part of Nigerian content is not hosted locally, even though we have achieved the 70 per cent domestication of traffic,” Rudman said.