Thailand as the IT hub of Asia - TOT's incompetence

[Prasert]

TOT's internet service has been a source of complaints for many years. The webboard on their website showed numerous daily complaints from their Thai customers and now that TOT has closed their webboard, other forums still show the ever returning complaints.

So what is the problem with their adsl service? Why is it so hard to reach the same service level offered in Europe or America?
As a former European ISP engineer I will try to provide some insight in this issue.

Let's have a look at how adsl works:

1. Your adsl router connects through the telephone line to a box called a DSLAM. A DSLAM has many telephone lines connected. After the adsl router is turned on, the dsl light on the router will lit up, saying that you have a connection with the DSLAM.
2. Now the adsl router looks for another box called the LAC. This LAC is a router located behind the DSLAM. It will say to your router "yes, connect to me and I will take care of your traffic".
3. This LAC then contacts another router called LNS and says: "I have an adsl router that wants to login with a username and a password".
4. The LNS router checks the username and password. If okay, it will send your adsl router an IP address (PPP session) and then your connected to the internet. Once this is done, the internet light on your adsl router lits up.

Now let's have a look at TOT.
ad 1. The telephone line was always used for phone calls. A conversation only needs a small part of the capacity (bandwidth) available. This is why adsl is used so widely: the unused capacity is perfect for internet. But..... to use this remaining capacity the quality of the line must be good. Engineers have twisted cable connections by hand for decades, sealing it off with cheap pvc tape. But in this climate the pvc tape wears off soon and the connections corrode. Telephone still works but adsl has a hard time coping with this bad line.
A solution? Solder the connections and use rubber tape which is durable and seals the connection air-tight and water-proof. But who will tell the cable engineers to change their way of working after doing the same for decades.....

ad 2. The LAC routers that should say "yes connect to me" behave differently on the TOT network. They often don't say anything at all! Since the requests from all adsl routers are sent out over every available connection, these requests also show up on my adsl line when the TOT router is unresponsive.
The standard adsl router will never show this. But by using a high-end router like Cisco it is possible to see these requests! And by configuring this Cisco router as a LAC it will tell the other routers "yes, connect to me and I will take care of your traffic".
I will not explain how to do this since it is basically hijacking, but it is a big security issue. People that manage to do this will receive ALL your traffic and can eavesdrop all of it. Passwords, electronic banking, creditcards used on the internet, emails - it can all be abused by someone with criminal intentions and you will never know.
And TOT allows this to happen!
So why are their LAC routers unresponsive? There can be many causes. Most likely is that the router is too busy - the processor load is too high and it cannot handle anymore connections. But to know for sure the engineers would have to monitor the CPU loads of all their routers throughout the country. According to the comments of TOT engineers they don't have a clue about all this, so I can conclude nobody is monitoring anything at all.
The solution: replace to router with a more powerful model or put another router next to it so it to distribute the load.

ad 3 & 4. Even when your adsl router finally makes a connection to the internet, that connection has to be maintained by all the TOT equipment between your house and their main network. Any ripple and your connection drops. E.g. my connection drops every 10 minutes, most of the time it reconnects in 30 seconds but sometimes it takes over 20 minutes. The cause? TOT equipment unable to cope with the services that were sold by the company employees.

So this all is not about the download speeds, which form a major part of all complaints. No, this is about the stability of the adsl service that TOT offers. It's not stable and the equipment used is lacking the capacity to cope with the demand. Still, TOT is now offering 8Mbps connections which will only stress their suffering equipment even more, causing more complaints from customers. Selling something you don't have is a scam and at least not legal.

Thailand is aiming to become the IT hub of south-east Asia. Maybe it would be a good start to try the domestic approach: teach your own engineers so they possess the knowledge to handle the equipment. Only then will these engineers be capable of understanding the equipment. The English language is the first requirement: all networking equipment uses the English language for programming and detailed documentation is mostly only available in English.
And that is something that won't change overnight. The new generation of university students is already showing that they can think differently and are capable of analyzing problems instead of using the trial-and-error approach of the current engineers. But they will have to work their way up in their new jobs; an engineer working at TOT for over 20 years has a higher status than the young and eager university graduate that thinks differently. He will not easily accept that the newbie knows better.
And of course, these engineers will never accept that a farang engineer knows better....

So will TOT ever reach that service level comparable to the West? Maybe with the next generation. Technical solutions require more than skilled engineers to be implemented, they require company management that understands this concept of "service level". I will put my bets on the next generation and hope that they will bring Thailand a step closer to the goal of becoming the IT hub of Asia.
Meanwhile, let's hope that nobody will be a victim of the security holes left open in TOT's infrastructure.

[Sean Moran]

Excuse me for my ignorance, having only quickly read through the detailed information provided. Thank you for the information.

I only ask at first if the inherent problem with using copper wires (terminated in whatever way once upon a time so as to suit voice telephony), is that there is no guarantee that the same wires that have been used quite happily for decades even with a little bit of background crackle as the rats in the ceiling chew in the rubber can necessarily support reliable data transmission?

ADSL is a wonderful stop-gap measure for telcos that can't afford to run fibre-optic to every home in every moobaan in every soi in Petchabun, but the labour costs to make it perfect are more than the customer can afford. Try 56k for a good test, and if you're getting un-plugged by your ISP more often than you're getting cut off by your bad phone line, then ADSL might run a little more smoothly. ADSL wasn't meant to be perfect.

I'll go back and have a more concentrated read now.

<edit: typos and innuendo removed>

[Ian]

What puzzles me in Thailand is the relationship between TOT and True. My telephone and Internet is supplied by True, yet when I make an overseas call I get charged by TOT. This has caught me out several times as I pay True by direct debit, so then found myself chased by True for unpaid bills. Why can't True pay TOT and add it to my bill?
Incidentally talking about security, when I internet bank with my British bank I go through 4 security checks, two of these checks are randomised so intercepting my replies would not work a second time. When I do the same with SCB I have just one check, a password.

[Sean Moran]

Ian I recommend that you stay away from Internet banking and direct debit systems. There can only be one winner in any transaction and in either of those cases, it won't be you.

[sulasno]

What puzzles me in Thailand is the relationship between TOT and True. My telephone and Internet is supplied by True, yet when I make an overseas call I get charged by TOT. This has caught me out several times as I pay True by direct debit, so then found myself chased by True for unpaid bills. Why can't True pay TOT and add it to my bill?
Incidentally talking about security, when I internet bank with my British bank I go through 4 security checks, two of these checks are randomised so intercepting my replies would not work a second time. When I do the same with SCB I have just one check, a password.

I thought that CAT holds the monopoly to international calls ...............................

I suppose SCB got a better system than other banks; Kbank requires additional password sent by SMS when doing transfers

[Ian]

Ian I recommend that you stay away from Internet banking and direct debit systems. There can only be one winner in any transaction and in either of those cases, it won't be you.

I could not possibly live the way I do without Internet banking, however I am aware of the risks and also how to minimise them. One thing I do is keep my capital spread around, if an account ever became compromised I would only lose 25%, very annoying but not the end of the world. It also helps if the bank managers know you personally and trust your integrity. At least in England, with false Direct Debits or Standing Orders, the bank is always on your side.

[Sean Moran]

Here in Australia, they use the direct-debit system to extract an extra (fine-print contract) three month's worth of payments out of you after you finish dealing with them, and whoop-de-doo! It's all frucking legal!

[Ian]

Here in Australia, they use the direct-debit system to extract an extra (fine-print contract) three month's worth of payments out of you after you finish dealing with them, and whoop-de-doo! It's all frucking legal!

Well my DDs cover just utilities, water, electricity, phone, internet, as I will be using these until I die they would have fun getting an extra three months out of me

[Sean Moran]

Well my DDs cover just utilities, water, electricity, phone, internet, as I will be using these until I die they would have fun getting an extra three months out of me

Oh well that's good then. We are drifting a bit off-topic here anyway. I believe this thread is to discuss the benefits of weatherproof and rat-proof terminators on coppoer wire.

[Ian]

Well my DDs cover just utilities, water, electricity, phone, internet, as I will be using these until I die they would have fun getting an extra three months out of me

Oh well that's good then. We are drifting a bit off-topic here anyway. I believe this thread is to discuss the benefits of weatherproof and rat-proof terminators on coppoer wire.

Thank you for that humorous reply, it reminds me tha rat proofing might be an important factor here, unlike in England.
I wonder if any IEE regs cover this topic?