Energy crisis in Lebanon leads to widening telecoms blackouts

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Network data from NetBlocks confirm the loss of internet service in parts of Beirut, Lebanon from the evening of Saturday 15 January 2022. The intermittent disruptions to connectivity follow an escalating pattern of destabilization of infrastructure as the country’s energy crisis deepens.

State provider Ogero stated earlier on Saturday that communications would “stop working as our last liter of diesel runs out.”

The provider reported later on Sunday that services were “temporarily suspended until we are resupplied with diesel,” explaining that the situation was due to “circumstances beyond our control.”

What’s driving Lebanon’s energy crisis?

Lebanon has been experiencing rolling power blackouts amid soaring energy prices. The economic crisis was exacerbated by a massive explosion in August 2020 that tore through the capital, decimating the business district. The crisis is attributed by many to lack of oversight and mismanagement of finances by the political elite.

 

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Methodology

NetBlocks diffscans, which map the IP address space of a country in real time, show internet connectivity levels and corresponding outages. Purposeful internet outages may have a distinct network pattern used by NetBlocks to determine and attribute the root cause of an outage, a process known as attribution which follows detection and classification stages.

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