US Agency Votes To Launch Review, Update Undersea Telecommunications Cable Rules (usnews.com) 21
The Federal Communications Commission voted on Thursday to propose new rules governing undersea internet cables in the face of growing security concerns, as part of a review of regulations on the links that handle nearly all the world's online traffic. From a report: The FCC voted 5-0 on proposed updates to address the national security concerns over the global network of more than 400 subsea cables that handle more than 98% of international internet traffic. [...]
Baltic nations said this week they are investigating whether the cutting of two fiber-optic undersea telecommunication cables in the Baltic Sea was sabotage. Rosenworcel noted that in 2023 Taiwan accused two Chinese vessels of cutting the only two cables that support internet access on the Matsu Islands and Houthi attacks in the Red Sea may have been responsible for the cutting of three cables providing internet service to Europe and Asia.
Baltic nations said this week they are investigating whether the cutting of two fiber-optic undersea telecommunication cables in the Baltic Sea was sabotage. Rosenworcel noted that in 2023 Taiwan accused two Chinese vessels of cutting the only two cables that support internet access on the Matsu Islands and Houthi attacks in the Red Sea may have been responsible for the cutting of three cables providing internet service to Europe and Asia.
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Reports say that the ships captain is a Russian.
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What report? The only information coming out shows it is a Chinese ship [npr.org], the Yi Peng 3, which did sail from a Russian port, but nothing about the captain being Russian.
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Previous 2023 cable cuts were done by Newnew ship, Newnew has a huge deal signed by Rosatom aka they work for the russians. Wont be surprised to learn its the same here.
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They started it, and we ought to end it — on our terms.
Yeah it looks like Putin is going to be your new best buddy.
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Well, we believe we know who the saboteurs were. There's a very good chance our guess is correct, but it's far from certain.
Background on the Baltic incident (Score:5, Interesting)
Last year, a gas pipeline between Finland and Estonia broke while a Chinese vessel called Newnew Polar Bear was sailing near the site. It was suggested that they were dragging their anchor along the bottom for stabilization during a storm, and a broken-off anchor of a matching size/desing was found at the site. The Chinese later admitted it was an accident they had caused. Of course, the REAL explanation is Putin who doesn't like that we finally manned up and joined NATO.
Now it looks like a similar incident with a Chinese vessel. It seems like an efficient job as they've hit two cables where they cross each other, one between Sweden and Lithuania, and the other between Finland and Germany. According to the latest news I've seen, the Chinese vessel was on its way out from the Baltic, but it's now parked at sea near Denmark, awaiting for further instructions from their superiors.
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I bought their USB charger on Amazon.
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and they got rewarded for this accidental dragging of the anchor: "Rosatom said the agreement with China’s Hainan Yangpu NewNew Shipping Co. Ltd would establish a joint venture" https://gcaptain.com/russias-r... [gcaptain.com]
No rule can address physical sabotage (Score:3)
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AT&T had this problem solved in the early 1990s. The issue is that it takes a strand of dark fiber, end-to-end, to implement. If they had that kind of protection in place, the operator would have know the second the fiber cable on the seafloor moved. They wouldn't have been able to stop the cut but they could have had a helicopter above the vessel while it was still pulling in the anchor chain.
Alternately, they could start burying the cables except around fault zones.
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I think early detection is the only really viable solution.
If someone wants to break something, they will break it. All we can adjust is the time and effort it takes to do so.
If making the cable harder to break also makes repairs harder, at what point is it just not worth it.
Maybe they could make the cables easier to repair, but no harder to break?
Use satellites in LEO instead (Score:2)
Make a broadband satellite network in LEO (low earth orbit). It has to be in LEO so that there won't be any latency difference (in fact it likely will noticeably improve latency since light travels 50% faster in space than in glass). Satellite to satellite optical links can very easily beat fiber optic cable in terms of bandwidth (Reference: https://www.rpmclasers.com/blo... [rpmclasers.com] ) . The main problem the uplink from Earth .. laser modulation signals are blocked or shifted by clouds and atmospheric turbulence. Ma
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The other problem is that satellites are hardly invulnerable either. If it's china doing this, and if we got into open warfare and they didn't mind telegraphing it to the world, they could certainly take out the satellites.
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By disrupting undersea cabling here and there they can have plausible deniability and can play a cat & mouse game to undermine us strategically without major consequences to themselves. If we're at the point of China openly taking out our satellites that's a WWIII invitation.