In our previous article, we discussed how undersea cables connect the Philippines, explaining how internet traffic flows across networks, for example from a hotel in Cebu to an office in Manila. Now we can turn to consider how business internet traffic flows internationally, from say an office in Manila to an office in Sydney.
International interconnectivity is essential for a country like the Philippines, with the majority of information accessed by Filipinos being hosted outside of the nation. Transit or upstream internet providers are fundamental for ISPs to transmit data all over the world. RISE endeavors to only procure international transit from reputable upstream ISPs.
These links are actively monitored for congestion and latency to better position our team of experts to quickly react to the ever-changing environment. It must be noted that RISE, like many other ISPs, controls only a very small part of the global internet and cannot control how upstream internet providers operate their networks. Investing in beneficial relationships with different upstream ISPs is an important aspect of how the internet works, as this subsequently impacts upon your internet experience as an end user.
Therefore, when choosing an internet service provider in the Philippines, it is useful to examine the points of presence, upstream internet providers and internet exchanges that different ISPs connect to.
What are Points of Presence (PoP)?
Points of presence (PoP) typically refer to the access points or physical locations where your internet service provider has equipment, both domestically and internationally. The routers, switches, servers and any other necessary devices for traffic to cross over networks can all be found at PoPs.
Having more PoPs means that there are more interconnectivity options, keeping ISPs connected across the globe. However, it is essential to understand that a greater number of PoPs does not always correlate with a higher quality ISP. One given ISP could have 5 times the amount of PoPs as another, but still offer a less superior internet service.
When looking at PoP, location is crucial. For the Asia Pacific region, you will often see Singapore or Hong Kong listed as PoP for ISPs, with RISE also having PoPs in both of these locations. These are the key connection hubs in the region, making the inter-connectivity capabilities they represent extremely important for RISE’s network
As no one organization or company can own every PoP, at some point your provider will need to connect to other providers to move data outside of their network to ensure it successfully reaches its final destination.
Transit (Upstream Internet Providers)
It is always important to remember that the internet is a network of networks. No single provider has direct connectivity to everything on the internet, which is where the use of Peer networks or transit providers become essential to moving data around (See part 1 in our series for a discussion on the differences between peering and transit).
Transit providers operate as the ‘upstream providers’ of your internet service. Similar to how owning or renting capacity on undersea cables out of the Philippines can affect your traffic flow, so too does the upstream ISP determine the way your data will flow.
The use of upstream internet providers requires a network to pay another provider to access the internet. Note that this is different to peering, as in the case of upstream providers one is always higher than the other in the hierarchy, and the providers do not equally benefit from the exchange. Once the data packets reach your upstream provider it is then their full responsibility to ensure they are delivered to their intended destination. Therefore, it is important to understand which upstream ISPs your provider is purchasing internet from.
Depending on where most of your traffic is traveling, you want to ensure that your ISP actually has strong upstream internet providers in that region. Redundancy, or having access to a diverse range of undersea cables with high capacity, as well as many PoPs, will allow for optimal routing in and out of the region. That way, if there is an issue with one particular upstream provider, the ISP can reroute traffic through another upstream provider.
The pricing of your transit provider is often an indication of quality, with cheaper transit providers typically resulting in lower quality. Thus, whilst a cheaper business internet provider is always tempting, it is not always a wise decision. Higher quality transit providers, although more expensive for ISPs to invest in, will result in a higher quality internet service.
For RISE in particular, we offer a visual representation of the network on our website. Keep in mind that this network does update every 30 minutes with transits constantly changing.
Internet Exchanges
Finally, you need to consider the internet exchanges, or the physical locations where the handoff of data occurs. Internet exchanges are one of the building blocks of the internet and are located all across the globe. Their locations are typically inside a data centre and allow ISPs to peer or exchange traffic between their networks. These internet exchanges are often near PoPs and this proximity is a significant factor in determining how fast traffic is able to flow across the internet.
The purpose of an internet exchange is, instead of sending internet traffic overseas and then back, or sending traffic through your transit provider and then back, the exchanges allow your network to start talking to other networks directly, making the process more efficient. Some of the key reasons to connect to an internet exchange are cost, latency and bandwidth. The increased number of paths that an internet exchange provides for, helps to improve the routing efficiency and redundancy of a network, allowing users to experience lower latency, and ensuring that there is no packet loss or issues with connectivity.
RISE has established our own internet exchange called GetaFIX, which is aimed at bringing high quality CDN (content delivery network) connectivity and peering to ISPs in the Philippines. You may learn more about GetaFIX in our next article.
