Opinion: Exercises Should Be More Than Just 'Disconnecting the Network'! Upgrading to a National Resilience Communication Strategy from a Control Mindset

When the NCC (National Communications Commission) and relevant agencies promote mobile network stress tests or exercises, society often accompanies them with confusion and complaints: 'I pay a monthly fee, why should I cooperate with the disconnection?' 'What is being verified in half an hour of disconnection?' The public's complaints are not against the establishment of disaster prevention and backup mechanisms by the state, but stem from information asymmetry—people do not know what they are learning, nor do they know what the government is verifying. If an exercise brings society only the perception of 'suddenly unable to scroll IG on the phone,' it is only fair that it is criticized as 'disturbing and performative.' This controversy exposes the biggest blind spot in the current government's promotion of resilience building: exercise design is still stuck in traditional 'control thinking' and has not advanced to 'capability building thinking.' A truly consensus-building, resilience-constructing exercise should not aim to 'disconnect the network' but to 'verify resilient communication.' We must shift the communication core from 'testing whether the network will be disconnected' to 'testing whether the country can still function even if the network is disconnected.' This is not just a difference in tone but a fundamental leap in the logic of national governance and social acceptance. The past policy mindset has been inclined towards 'disaster prevention (Prevention),' attempting to ensure that the system never breaks; however, in the face of modern geopolitical threats, extreme weather, and cyber-attacks, the internationally accepted new mindset is 'resilience (Resilience)'—acknowledging that extreme events will inevitably occur, with the focus on how the system can quickly recover after being hit. Therefore, the government must distill policy slogans that deeply resonate with the public: 'True exercises are not about disconnecting phones; they are about proving that society can still function even if the network is disconnected.' 'True resilience is not about never disconnecting the network; it is about ensuring that any disconnection will not halt the nation.' These two sentences can instantly shift the focus of the exercise from 'restricting citizens' rights' to 'building national capabilities.' To implement the 'capability building mindset,' future communication exercises must undergo a comprehensive overhaul: 1. Transparent and Indicative: Let the people know 'what is being verified' Exercises should not only announce 'mobile communication will be obstructed from what time to what time' but should also simultaneously disclose the pressure test of five key indicators crucial to social operations: Emergency rescue: Is the 110, 119 reporting system 100% maintained? Medical dispatch: Are the ambulance GPS and hospital emergency data synchronized in real-time? Public transportation: Is the subway and railway dispatch system affected? Livelihood logistics: Is the supply chain and logistics database still functioning normally? When citizens see the entire national backbone system undergoing a stress test, rather than their network being arbitrarily cut off, policy identification will be entirely different. 2. Dynamic Capability Demonstration: Exercises should not only demonstrate 'cannot' but must showcase 'can' The most unsuccessful exercise is only demonstrating 'paralysis after disconnection' to the public; the most successful exercise is showcasing the activation of 'backup mechanisms.' The exercise should publicly display a rapid recovery progression to society: Minute 01: Land-based base station signal interrupted. Minute 05: Low-orbit and high-orbit satellites take over backup. Minute 10: Mobile communication vehicles arrive at key nodes for deployment. Minute 15: Communication drones take off to construct an airborne relay station. Minute 20: Phones form a mesh network. Minute 30: Important government agencies and command centers resume full data exchange. People need to see with their own eyes: the government is not shutting down the network but demonstrating how to 'bring the network back.' 3. National Participation: Promoting the '30-Minute Offline Resilience Challenge' Transforming citizens who passively accept disconnection into individuals who actively participate in testing. During the exercise, the government can advocate for the '30-Minute Family Offline Challenge,' encouraging the public to practice using traditional text messages, voice calls, paper maps, offline navigation, and offline payments, and even agreeing on emergency meeting points with family members. This can prompt every family to start thinking: 'If we really encounter a major power outage or disconnection, how will we contact each other? Where will the children be picked up? How will the elderly be cared for?' This is the most down-to-earth national disaster education. 4. Future Technology Showcase: Presenting new technologies that ensure 'no paralysis during disconnection' and 'no interruption during interference' Exercises are an excellent stage to showcase a country's technological strength. The government should use this opportunity to publicly display advanced communication backup technologies to its citizens: Mesh Network (Mesh Network): Demonstrate how phones can relay messages to each other without a base station using P2P relay. Satellite Text Messaging and High-Altitude Balloons: Demonstrate how civilian devices can directly connect to low-orbit satellites and high-altitude platforms. AI Automatic Routing (Route Selection): Show how algorithms automatically find the best signal path in environments with severe interference. This can make citizens understand that future communication security does not solely rely on ground-based telecom base stations. 5. Competition Mechanization: Introducing International Resilience Metrics (Resilience Indicators) Exercises should shed the bureaucratic culture of 'putting on a show' and introduce competitive and quantitative mechanisms, competing in recovery speed (Recovery Time) rather than 'downtime': Which city can restore 90% of its communication capabilities the fastest? Which telecom operator can switch to satellite backup the fastest? Which hospital can achieve zero-interruption switching when the system is obstructed? With a competitive mechanism, units will truly invest resources in building 'resilience.' 6. Data Declassification: After the exercise, let the data speak For officials not to just stand at a press conference and read a script saying 'the exercise was successful.' The government must disclose objective data: The proportion of affected base stations and the average recovery time in minutes. The average delay in seconds and success rate of the 110/119 reporting system. The time taken for government key data centers to switch to backup. Use objective data to prove that this is a rigorous stress test, not a political show for show. Finally, this transformation should start with 'renaming.' The government should immediately abolish terms like 'mobile network obstruction exercise,' which are full of passivity, negativity, and restrictive connotations, and formally rename it to 'National Resilient Communications Exercise (National Resilient Communications Exercise).' The change in name represents a shift in mindset. We no longer show the people how vulnerable we are but prove to the world and all citizens that Taiwanese society has strong self-repair capabilities. When exercises are no longer meaningless half-hour disconnections but a collective evolution of national mobilization, technological showcases, and system resilience, we can truly build a resilient society where 'any disconnection will not halt the nation.'