Ethiopia Experiences Brief BGP Control Plane Disruption

Ethiopia registered a brief but notable disruption to its internet control plane on Wednesday morning. The event, centered on Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) visibility, lasted approximately 20 minutes, starting around 09:10 UTC.

Technical Details

The disruption recorded a severity score of 110, with the primary impact observed on the BGP median signal. This signal measures the control plane visibility and stability of advertised network prefixes. A drop of 6% from the peak was recorded in the number of visible BGP paths during the event window.

Other network signals showed concurrent but less pronounced deviations. Active probing for ICMP reachability across IPv4 address blocks showed a 7% drop. Backscatter measurements, which serve as a proxy for aggregate connectivity, recorded a more significant 44% decline from their peak value during the same period.

The cause has not been publicly attributed. No official statements from service providers or government entities were immediately available.

Network metrics indicated a return to baseline levels shortly after the disruption concluded.