electricsheepafrica/africa-ixp-routing-exposure

Africa IXP & Routing Exposure

Electric Sheep Africa · Post-Quantum Cryptographic Exposure cluster · dataset DS-3 · v0.1

African digital infrastructure is being recorded by state actors today under the assumption it will be decryptable once quantum computers arrive (2030–2035 per NIST/NCSC/ENISA). This dataset is one dimension of the Africa-specific evidence for that claim.

What this dataset answers

Which African countries lack local internet exchange points and therefore route domestic traffic through foreign jurisdictions?

Key findings (v0.1)

• 87 African IXPs are registered in PeeringDB across 42 of 54 countries.
• 12 African countries have no IXP in PeeringDB; their domestic traffic leaves the continent and returns.
• 262 RIPE Atlas probes across 37 countries are available to measure the routing detour penalty.

Files

ds3_ixp_country_coverage.csv (54 rows)

Column	Example
country_code	DZ
country	Algeria
n_ixps	0
total_peers	0
has_ixp	False

ds3_african_ixps.csv (87 rows)

Column	Example
ix_id	592
ixp_name	NAPAfrica IX Johannesburg
country_code	ZA
country	South Africa
city	Johannesburg
n_peers	768
net_count	548

ds3_ripe_probe_coverage.csv (54 rows)

Column	Example
country_code	ZA
country	South Africa
connected_probes	133

Method

African IXPs and their peering membership were pulled from PeeringDB. Country coverage marks states with no IXP present. RIPE Atlas probe counts establish where intra-African routing detours can be actively measured (the millisecond-detour leg).

Sources

PeeringDB API; RIPE Atlas probe API.

Limitations

PeeringDB undercounts vs on-the-ground IXP censuses (Coalition for Digital Africa reported 63 IXPs in 38 countries, 2024). The millisecond detour penalty is not yet measured in this version; the probe inventory shows the measurement is in reach.

How to cite

Electric Sheep Africa (2026). Africa IXP & Routing Exposure (africa-ixp-routing-exposure). African Cryptographic Exposure & Post-Quantum Risk dataset cluster. Hugging Face. https://huggingface.co/datasets/electricsheepafrica/africa-ixp-routing-exposure

@dataset{esa_africa_ixp_routing_exposure_2026,
  title  = {Africa IXP & Routing Exposure},
  author = {Electric Sheep Africa},
  year   = {2026},
  publisher = {Hugging Face},
  url    = {https://huggingface.co/datasets/electricsheepafrica/africa-ixp-routing-exposure}
}

Part of the cluster

This is one of eight datasets in the African Cryptographic Exposure & Post-Quantum Risk cluster by Electric Sheep Africa. The others cover TLS deployment, certificate-authority dependency, algorithm inventory, submarine cable topology, IXP/routing exposure, the regulatory gap, incident history, and PQC migration cost. See the collection on the electricsheepafrica org page.

Methodology & ethics

All collection is passive and uses public data, or standard TLS handshakes against publicly reachable endpoints (the same a browser performs). No interception, no exploitation, no private access. Figures are v0.1 and reproducible from the open collector code.