On the Internet Connectivity in Africa

Published

November 18, 2015

Author(s)

Assane Gueye, Peter Mell, Desire Banse, Faical Y. Congo

Abstract

This study measures and documents growth of Internet connectivity in Africa from 2010 to 2014 with a focus on inter-country relationships. We evaluate both intra-continent connectivity as well as connectivity to other continents. An initial analysis reveals a modest increase in the number of participating countries but an explosive increase in the number of routers and network links. We then form the first country level topology maps of the African Internet and evaluate the robustness of the network. This includes a study of raw connectivity, pairwise shortest paths, and betweeness centrality. We then suggest how improvements can be made to the inter-country African connectivity to enhance its robustness without reliance on paths traversing multiple continents.

Proceedings Title

Proceedings of the 7th EAI International Conference on e-Infrastructure and e-Services for Developing Countries

Conference Dates

December 16-17, 2015

Conference Location

Cotonou, BJ

Conference Title

7th EAI International Conference on e-Infrastructure and e-Services for Developing Countries

Pub Type

Conferences

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Keywords

Network topology, network communication

Citation

Gueye, A. , Mell, P. , Banse, D. and Congo, F. (2015), On the Internet Connectivity in Africa, Proceedings of the 7th EAI International Conference on e-Infrastructure and e-Services for Developing Countries, Cotonou, BJ, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=919630 (Accessed October 17, 2025)