Coronavirus outbreak: Akamai outlines efforts to deliver stable internet during lockdown

As employees around the world work from home and millions of students start taking classes online, the load on the internet service providers are more than ever. So, one of the world's biggest content delivery providers, Akamai has revealed how it is handling the pressure from different parts of the world. The company is betting big on its edge network architecture that is claimed to minimise network congestion. Since the firm has deployed its infrastructure into carrier networks they can "help those networks avoid overload by diverting traffic away from areas experiencing high levels of congestion," said Tom Leighton, CEO, Akamai.

Leighton added that Akamai is also working with distributors of software, specially in the gaming industry like Sony and Microsoft to manage congestion during peak usage. "This is very important for gaming software downloads which account for large amounts of internet traffic when an update is released -- a software update for a modern game generates an amount of traffic roughly equal to 30,000 web pages," adds Leighton.

Akamai says it will be reducing gaming software downloads at peak times in regions where demand is "creating bottlenecks for customers." The aims with this is to deliver stable internet speeds to all the users while giving enough bandwidth for gamers to download heavy titles. However, it may take some more time to download titles.

However, Akamai users across other segments including healthcare, financial services, manufacturing and more won't face any issues as such, states Leighton.

"As the world responds to the challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic, we will continue working with governments, network operators and our customers to minimize stress on the system. At the same time, we will do our best to make sure that everyone who is relying on the internet for their work, studies, news, and entertainment continues to have a high-quality, positive experience."