The Ministry of Science and ICT has raised an objection to the measurement method in response to public opinion that the results of Internet speed measurements in Korea have significantly decreased compared to the previous year.

The Ministry of Science and ICT explained on the 4th that the Internet measurement method of Ookla, which operates the Internet access performance analysis web service 'Speed Test', is limited because it is not objective.

It was revealed that the ranking of Korea's ultra-high-speed internet speeds released by Speedtest dropped significantly from 19th place (210.72 Mbps) in August 2022 to 34th place (171.12 Mbps) in November 2022.

The Ministry of Science and ICT's position is that objective comparisons between countries are limited because Ukla does not disclose specific measurement conditions, methods, and contents, such as the number and performance of measurement servers in each country, the total number of measurements by country, and measurement speed distribution, in addition to Internet speed and ranking.

In addition, refuting this, he claimed that the results of the 22-year telecommunication service quality evaluation (22.12.29) showed that the 500 Mbps and 1 Gbps internet speeds in 22 years had improved compared to the previous year. The 500M class (850,000 cases) presented the user constant evaluation results as 470.08 Mbps in 2021 -> 493.34 Mbps in 2022, and the 1G class (2.54 million cases) presented the user constant evaluation results as 962.62 Mbps in 2021 -> 980.86 Mbps in 2022.

The Ministry of Science and ICT, along with its rebuttal, pointed out that according to OECD statistics (December 21), 40 out of 100 Korean residents are subscribers to internet at 100 Mbps or higher, and that the proportion of optical cable-based lines out of the total number of wired internet lines is 86.61%, the highest in the world. Japan (83.34%) and Spain (78.95%) followed.

■ How do the three mobile carriers measure Internet speed? Ookla's 'Speedtest' simultaneously analyzes Internet connection performance, including connection data speed and latency. It is a method of measuring the data speed and latency of an Internet connection to one of geographically distributed servers. Each test measures download data speeds, upload data speeds, and tests are performed within the user's web browser or app.

Our country's National Intelligence Service (NIS) also provides high-speed Internet speed tests and Internet quality weather maps by service on its website.

Install the measurement program, and when you re-enter the site, select the telecommunications company (SKT, KT, LG U+, etc.) and product and region on the first screen. You can get the measurement results right away. Also, on the Korea Promotion Agency site, you can use the Measurement Statistics tab to see the average speed and status of wired Internet nationwide in the form of a weather map. You can compare the Internet speed you receive with the actual quality.

The three mobile carriers provide minimum guaranteed speeds for each ultra-high-speed Internet product. Last year, a YouTuber reported that KT's actual Internet usage speeds were different, and the three mobile carriers' Internet service quality measurement methods became widely known.

The method is simple. Customers can measure their internet speeds on the sites of each of the three telecommunications companies. They can conduct quality assurance (SLA) tests by measuring their internet speeds in the customer support window of each site, and file an objection if the minimum speed is not met.

SLA (Service Level Agreement) is a contract between a service provider and a subscriber, which means a mutual agreement that the service provider must provide a pre-defined level of service to the subscriber.

For example, you can click on the 'Quality Assurance Test' item in the KT Customer Support tab and file a quality assurance objection if the warranty criteria are not met 3 or more times out of 5. The SLA test takes about 30 minutes per session.

The minimum guaranteed speeds for each KT Internet product are: △Lite: 2Mbps (FTTH: 25Mbps) △Internet Slim: 2Mbps (FTTH/Ntopia: 50Mbps) △Internet Slim Plus: 100Mbps △Internet Basic: 250Mbps △Internet Essence: 500Mbps △Internet Premium: 1.25Gbps △Internet Premium Plus: 2.5Gbps △Internet Super Premium: 5Gbps.
SKT Broadband can measure Internet SLA quality through MySpeed Test. If you measure more than 5 times over 30 minutes and more than 60% of the measured values are below the minimum speed (download speed), the usage fee for that day will be reduced.

The minimum download compensation speeds are: △Optical LAN: 50 Mbps △Speed: 5 Mbps △Band Giga Lite: 250 Mbps, Band Giga/Giga Premium: 500 Mbps △10 Giga Premium: 5 Gbps (5000 Mbps) △5 Giga Premium: 2.5 Gblps (2500 Mbps) △2.5 Giga Premium: 1.25 Gbps.
LG U+ can only be used by members through customer support to measure internet speed. If there are more failures than successes in the 5 SLA tests, you can file an objection. The minimum guaranteed speeds for ultra-high-speed Internet are listed as △Optical LAN (100M plan): 50Mbps △Giga Slim Internet (500M plan): 250Mbps △Giga Internet (1G plan): 500Mbps.

Consumers can file an objection if the speed is not met after conducting an SLA test on the official website using the method above, and it is important to eliminate factors that reduce the speed. For example, it is accurate to conduct the test by directly connecting the WAN cable, and in the case of Wi-Fi, connect to a network with 5G, not 2.4G.