Types of communications in Algeria, including telephones, mass media and the Internet.
Telephones - main lines in use: 3.068 million (2007) country comparison to the world: 48 Telephones - mobile cellular: 43.227 million (2015) [1] country comparison to the world: 31 Telephone system: domestic: good service in north but sparse in south; domestic satellite system with 12 earth stations (20 additional domestic earth stations are planned) international: 5 submarine cables; microwave radio relay to Italy, France, Spain, Morocco, and Tunisia; coaxial cable to Morocco and Tunisia; participant in Medarabtel; satellite earth stations - 2 Intelsat (1 Atlantic Ocean and 1 Indian Ocean), 1 Intersputnik, and 1 Arabsat Internet Service Providers (ISPs): 03 (2005) Internet Hosts: 477 (2008) country comparison to the world: 161 Internet Users: 20 million (2007) country comparison to the world: 51 Country codes: .dz In October 2013, the Algeria Regulatory Authority for Post and Telecommunication awarded 3G licences to the three mobile operators in Algeria: Mobilis, Ooredoo, and Djezzy.
The authority imposed on mobile operators a 3G double numbering license.
In August 2012 a group in the Anonymous irc channel #OpAlgeria started an operation against the Algeria Regulatory Authority for Post and Telecommunication.
They also will require authorization for any type of virtual private network (VPN) technology (for example; PPTP, L2TP, GRE tunneling, OpenVPN, and most other protocols that allow protection of information).