COVID-19... We are in this together!

Thank you to those keeping the Internet performing reliably right now.

As the CEO of an Internet Monitoring company in a time that feels like we’re living on the Internet, I felt a responsibility to share an update on what Catchpoint is doing for our customers, employees, and community.

First, I wanted to acknowledge the heroes fighting the virus on so many frontlines. This includes medical professionals, those delivering essential services, relief organizations, parents having to work, educate, and take care of the kids, and countless others. Your heroism during this time is nothing short of inspirational. Thank you!

At the forefront of the “new normal” is our reliance on the Internet.

With the dire need to avoid physical human contact to stop the spread of the virus, we’re more reliant on Internet services than ever to stay connected, keep our businesses running, and ensure people have the necessities to survive.

And there’s certainly been a surge in Internet usage. Comcast says overall peak traffic on its network grew 32 percent in the last month, with much of that bandwidth involving voice and video calls.

There is one question we’ve been asked repeatedly.

How is the Internet handling COVID-19?

Our answer: With people.

There are many titles or job descriptions for the professionals who keep your organization’s website, intranet, or digital services fully available with consistency. They can be called operations engineers, performance specialists or site reliability engineers (SREs), DevOps, Network Admins, SysAdmins, among other names.

Right now, they’re operating around-the-clock in unfamiliar environments to keep critical Internet services online while facing ongoing capacity challenges. Think “Black Friday”-type stress without a clear finish line.

I’m urging you to acknowledge them, especially now, because in many cases they may be doing heroic work.

They’re ensuring we stay connected to our loved ones and colleagues through critical video conferencing, messaging, and work platforms like Zoom, Google, Apple, Microsoft, Dropbox, and Slack.

• They’re delivering food, medicine, masks, and anything else needed to survive and flatten the curve with services like Instacart, FreshDirect, Amazon, UPS, FedEx, Walgreens, and CVS.
• They’re keeping people entertained and inside with streaming platforms like HBO, Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Twitch, and YouTube.
• They’re keeping our children educated with eLearning platforms.
• They’re keeping us connected with our doctors through telemedicine.
• They’re sharing crucial information on the virus, how to stay safe, testing locations, and services for the economically disadvantaged.
• They’re keeping all these services ONLINE with infrastructure providers including ISPs, Last Mile, CDNs, DNS, Public Cloud, Cybersecurity, and VPNs.
• They are running Datacenters and Cloud infrastructure like Equinix, AWS, Azure, Google Cloud...
• They are our customers and our colleagues, and we have the awesome responsibility to support their efforts to keep their services available.

And they’re doing a damn good job at it!

Our monitoring data shows most ISPs holding up well considering the increased load. We’ve seen minor drops in response times and throughput compared to pre-crisis, but no major slowdowns or outages. We even saw gradual improvements between early and late March, as systems adjusted to the new normal.

While our data shows critical SaaS platforms are experiencing an increase in failures since the beginning of the outbreak, there have only been few sustained outages. It’s truly remarkable.

How is Catchpoint Helping?

1. By focusing on the POSITIVE and the long road ahead

We will NOT be naming and shaming organizations that suffer from outages to the media.

While news media would rely upon us for early and accurate information on high-impact outages and slowdowns, it is not appropriate right now to share information unless it is positive or productive.

2. By providing data to help fix issues and keep critical services online

We’re testing the critical websites and services facing elevated traffic, whether a customer or not, to help with troubleshooting.

Our teams are working overtime to monitor, detect, and communicate the root cause of outages that would have a serious impact on our lives if prolonged. Having this data early may save critical minutes of downtime.

While we are not reporting to the media, we are actively sharing directly with the affected companies.

3. By supporting suffering businesses

We’re providing our Employee Monitoring service for free

While services facing record traffic, we can’t lose sight of the businesses facing record low levels of traffic as demand for their services has fallen.

These organizations are mulling difficult measures like layoffs to survive the coming months. We’re concerned for our customers who may face uncertainty for their job security, adding anxiety to an already difficult situation.

These businesses still need to operate and ensure their employees are online – so we’ve decided to offer our Employee Monitoring service for free.

If interested, you can find more info here: https://www.catchpoint.com/remote-employee-support-program

4. By providing financial aid where needed

We’re reallocating budget to support hunger and education organizations

With schools closed, we’re concerned for children who previously relied on meals provided during the school day. We’re donating months of our pantry, event, and travel expenses to Feeding America and Action Against Hunger and matching employee donations. We are also donating to DonorsChoose.org to help children have access to computers.

I couldn’t be prouder of the countless Catchpointers who have contributed, especially those who have requested a portion of their salary to be donated!

If you would also like to make a donation to Feeding America and Action Against Hunger, please follow these links:

• Feeding America: https://www.feedingamerica.org/ 
• Action Against Hunger: https://www.actionagainsthunger.org/.
• DonorsChoose: https://www.donorschoose.org/coronavirus

Thank you all from the bottom of my heart!

Mehdi