I believe it is merely physics. You see, the Dark Zone sucks so hard that has turned into the equivalent of a black hole (similarly named as well). It now draws in all the cheaters from the PC world and none can escape its pull. All this has caused disturbances in space and time. You were not lagging, it was the Dark Zones event horizon ****ing with you.
Yep, seems like as plausible an answer as anything we won't be hearing from Ubisoft.