Taiwan is conducting its first-ever mobile network throttling exercise this week to test how the public responds to wartime communications disruptions, a new civil defence measure that has sparked criticism over the government’s preparedness.
The exercise, held in central Taiwan on Monday and planned for northern Taiwan on Thursday, will simulate severe mobile network congestion by reducing 4G and 5G bandwidth for 30 minutes.
About 17 million people, or 73 per cent of the island’s population, are expected to be affected, according to the National Communications Commission (NCC).
Rather than a complete internet shutdown, authorities said voice calls, SMS messages and emergency cell broadcasts would continue to function.
Services relying on mobile data, including video streaming, video calls, mobile payments, online banking, e-ticketing, food delivery, QR code verification, cloud synchronisation and app authentication, may become temporarily unavailable.
The first phase of the exercise in central Taiwan on Monday prompted complaints from users who said the throttling had effectively left them without mobile internet access.
Some reported that 4G and 5G connections had slowed to the point where they could not send messages online or even load a browser homepage.