Hong Kong Internet Exchange

Hong Kong Internet eXchange is an internet exchange point in Hong Kong. The cooperative project is initiated by the Information Technology Services Centre of the Chinese University of Hong Kong providing the service free of charge. It is now operated by HKIX Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of the CUHK Foundation.
The aim of the HKIX is to connect Internet service providers in Hong Kong so that intra-Hong Kong traffic can be exchanged locally without routing through the US or other countries. 99% internet interaction in Hong Kong goes through the centre, and HKIX acts as Hong Kong's network backbone. According to Cloudflare, HKIX is the largest internet exchange point in Asia.

WWW hkix.net

History

HKIX was founded in April 1995 by the Chinese University of Hong Kong. It reduced Hong Kong's reliance on US web servers and therefore made internet performance in Hong Kong faster.
In 2004, the HKIX2 back-up mirror site was created, which is located at CITIC Telecom Tower.
In 2009, HKIX announced their collaboration with Cisco Systems to deploy the Nexus 7000 series switch technology, marking HKIX the first among the world's leading internet exchanges.
As of 2013 the exchange handles 280 gigabits of information per second during its peak times every day. Chinese University stated that the amount of information is equivalent to 17,000 five-megapixel photographs. In 2013, Edward Snowden said that the National Security Agency gained access to the backbone and took data from it. Chinese University said that it did not find evidence of hacking.
In February 2017, it was announced that 3 more satellite sites were launched in data centres located in Fo Tan and Tseung Kwan O.
June 2020, HKIX added support for RPKI in order to enhance the security of HKIX routing.
In 2021, the HKIX1c was created, which is located at Cyberport on Hong Kong Island, running in active-active mode with independent power grid of HKIX1b.
In June 2024, HKIX1 was decommissioned, resulting in HKIX1b and HKIX1c becoming the two core sites.

Background

The concept of an "Internet Exchange" is very important after the NSFNet Backbone faded away because IAPs had to be interconnected to maintain full connectivity to the entire Internet.
In Hong Kong, the situation is a little bit different. Many of the IAPs in Hong Kong have their own links to the US. They have to connect to each other locally only to have faster and less expensive access to local sites. In addition, there are some commercial Internet Exchanges in Hong Kong for routing traffic within the city.

Facilities

Core sites

The HKIX1 was located on the Sha Tin campus of Chinese University. The door of the building that houses it has no sign. Danny Lee of the South China Morning Post said that the building that houses it is a "grey, bunker-like structure could easily pass for any other building" at the university. HKIX1 was decommissioned in June 2024.
HKIX1b is an extension to HKIX1 and was interconnected with HKIX1 by multiple 100 Gbit/s links. The data center is close to University station and is less than 2 km from HKIX1. The main purpose of establishing HKIX1b is to offer dual-core for high availability and for supporting more port connections.
HKIX1c is a new core site replacing HKIX1. The data centre is located in Cyberport.
Current core sites, HKIX1b and HKIX1c, are running in active-active mode, providing power resilience, chassis resilience and site resilience.

Members

As of December 2025, there are 311 participants connecting to the HKIX. The following are some of the major participants.