A system and method for protection of virtual connections at the data link layer. The method provides for protection switching in a ring network having first and second routes for transporting cells. These are virtual connections. For each virtual connection, one route is a working route and the other route is the protection route. The method comprises detecting an error in one of the first and second routes. Further, error cells are generated for each virtual connection in the ring network that is affected by the detected error. Error cells are injected to be transmitted down stream on the route in which the error was detected. The down stream network element receives the error cells and tracks the status of the first and second routes in the ring network based on the error cells. When an error is detected in a working route for a virtual connection, the method switches the virtual connection to the protection route for that virtual connection.
