An old television set used by a resident of a small British village caused Internet service disruptions for more than 18 months before it was discovered by engineers.
Since last year, residents in the British village of Aberhosan have noticed their Internet service would slow or drop out entirely, leading to numerous complaints against provider Openreach.
Earlier this year, Openreach replaced numerous utility lines in and around the village, hoping the problem would be resolved. When things didn’t improve, engineers began investigating other possible causes of the interference.
A monitoring device revealed the problems occurred daily around 7 a.m. Further investigation led engineers to an old television set being used at a home within the village.
“It turned out that at 7am every morning the occupant would switch on their old TV which would, in turn, knock out broadband for the entire village,” an engineer told BBC News.
The engineer said the TV set was emitting a single high-level impulse noise, known in the engineering world as SHINE. Those types of signals can cause interference with nearby electrical devices.
The interference has not returned since the set was switched off, the BBC said.
