Undersea Internet cables 'at risk of attack'

[UM-Bot]

The head of Britain's armed forces has warned that an attack on these cables could be 'catastrophic'.

http://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/news/314176/undersea-internet-cables-at-risk-of-attack

[Jon the frog]

Yeah focus on Russia and tell to everyone what to do to make big troubles and watch a funky bunch of dude going there and cutting it for fun.

[stevewinn]

I raised this very point in the Bitcoin thread a few days back. What happens in the event of war or catastrophic event the Internet will be the first casualty.

http://www.forces.net/news/russia-could-cut-internet-nato-countries-warns-defence-chief

[Jon the frog]

That's good no internet, people would start to be sane again including me !

[Herr Falukorv]

Fear mongering against russia as usual.. ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzz
A reason to keep the arms race 

From article
"Therefore we must continue to develop our maritime forces with our allies with whom we are working very closely, to match and understand Russian fleet modernisation."

 

[acute]

It wouldn't surprise me if they are trying to find a way to tap into our internet, rather than destroy the cables.

[stevewinn]

30 minutes ago, acute said:

It wouldn't surprise me if they are trying to find a way to tap into our internet, rather than destroy the cables.

That would be the first option and makes sense.

If it come down to tapping or cutting cables today; - these modern day cables carry that much information it would be hard to decipher all the information. So a way to cut through or cut out all the noise would be to disrupt the cables and force the use of other forms of communication such as satellite or Radio communication which would only be used by Govt's or military to carry vital information and easier to intercept. 

On cutting the cables the British in WW1 and WW2. cut undersea German cables and Japanese cables, Hong Kong to Saigon, Singapore - Saigon in both wars this forced the Germans & Japanese to use Radio communications which was easier to intercept.

So, even though this article states Russia as the ability or could cut the cables today, - Going by our past actions it would not be beyond the realms of possibility that we in the West also have the ability to cut Russian underwater sea cables.

[acute]

The countries in the West, and the British economy in particular, are heavily dependent on the internet.

If the Russians cut our cables and we cut theirs, we lose.

[Nzo]

There are still satellites. Governments and large institutions will still be able to communicate. Its the individual civilians that will be impacted more.

More scaremongering. There is a nation that is building their Navy and poses a real threat but its not Russia. Russia is being used because they are more salient to stupid people.

If cables were cut I would probably blame some environmental warriors before blaming a whole nation that use the internet.

And in the end would it be so bad if we all unplugged for a few months? Think of all the obesity rates that would start to fall.

[_KB_]

And so they decided to tell everyone, even the terrorists, that if you wan't to do some damage all you need to do is damage some poorly guarded cables in the ocean

[Unusual Tournament]

7 hours ago, _KB_ said:

And so they decided to tell everyone, even the terrorists, that if you wan't to do some damage all you need to do is damage some poorly guarded cables in the ocean

i see your point but for how much longer will Britain and the rest need to rely on cables to internet. satellites will be the future soon. 

[seeder]

we can connect to satellites with satellite phones you know.... and mobile phones dont use cables..

and Google uses hot air balloons to provide internet over parts of Africa where there have never been phone lines

 

Quote

 

More than half of the world's population is still without Internet access. Project Loon is a network of balloons traveling on the edge of space, designed to extend Internet connectivity to people in rural and remote areas worldwide.

High speed internet is transmitted up to the nearest balloon from our telecommunications partner on the ground, relayed across the balloon network, and then back down to users on the ground. We have demonstrated data transmission between balloons over 100 km apart in the stratosphere and back down to people on the ground with connection speeds of up to 10 Mbps, directly to their LTE phones.

https://x.company/loon/

 

 

 

 

Edited December 16, 2017 by seeder

[seeder]

see...no undersea cables needed for the world and the internet to STILL work

 

https://electronics.howstuffworks.com/tv-phone1.htm

 

 

 

 

 

[toast]

I remember a TV documentation I watched roughly 15 years ago about a student who wrote his doctoral thesis about the vulnerability of the US internet fiber-optic infrastructure by terrorism. Because of the informations the doctoral thesis provided, it has been classified as top secret by US authorities (if I remember correctly).

Quote

Sean Gorman knows where all the US fiber-optic cable is buried. He can fire up his digital map, then zoom in on a bank in Manhattan, drill down to a critical cable feeding a Nebraska nuclear power plant, and pinpoint the data lines serving a military installation in San Diego. No wonder the government wants to confiscate his dissertation.

Full article

Another one:

Quote

Dissertation Could Be Security Threat

Sean Gorman's professor called his dissertation "tedious and unimportant." Gorman didn't talk about it when he went on dates because "it was so boring they'd start staring up at the ceiling." But since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Gorman's work has become so compelling that companies want to seize it, government officials want to suppress it

Full aricle

 

Edited December 16, 2017 by toast

[SHaYap]

3 hours ago, seeder said:

see...no undersea cables needed for the world and the internet to STILL work

Satellites have time restriction 'windows' where connections aren't available due to bad weather and/or if the satellite is out of reach on its orbital path  ... reliability would be one of such concerns

~

Addendum :

Anyhow, satellites would be the primary and first targets in times of global conflict ... if I'm not wrong

Edited December 16, 2017 by third_eye
addendum

[stevewinn]

11 hours ago, Captain Risky said:

i see your point but for how much longer will Britain and the rest need to rely on cables to internet. satellites will be the future soon. 

Cables will remain long into the future as they represent the cheapest and fastest means of communicating. Satellites have limits nwadays the capacity of a fibre optic system can be in excess of 2 Tb/s, a tremendous amount of data, which could not easily be transmitted through Satellite communication networks. One disadvantage of satellite communications is the propagation delay.

A satellite in Geostationary orbit has to be at least 22,500 miles from the earth's surface. This means that the uplink would need to travel at least 45000 miles to reach the receiving station. Light travels at 186,000 miles per second, 45000 would be equivalent to 250ms delay on its outward route, and a further 250ms delay on its return. Half a second may be a short time in your lifetime, but an IP packet needs a much faster response. Satellite communication is not the answer to your problems, however most applications nowadays need the much faster response of a fibre optic cable. Typically propagation across the 3,500 miles of an Atlantic cable system is less than 15ms.

 

 

[thelion318]

I disagree that the cables are unprotected----there is a deep ocean, the corresponding pressures and other challenges to overcome in order to get at them. Difficult!

[toast]

16 minutes ago, thelion318 said:

I disagree that the cables are unprotected----there is a deep ocean, the corresponding pressures and other challenges to overcome in order to get at them. Difficult!

I will not explain why, but your are very wrong with your opinion.

[Herr Falukorv]

28 minutes ago, thelion318 said:

I disagree that the cables are unprotected----there is a deep ocean, the corresponding pressures and other challenges to overcome in order to get at them. Difficult!

No they are not protected... Here in the archipelago where I live these signs are everywhere 
It means that its forbidden to anchor there because you might catch or damage the cables.


And on the seacharts the cables are are drawn to show where they are..



 

[smokeycat]

Double Post. 

Edited December 16, 2017 by smokeycat

[smokeycat]

16 hours ago, Captain Risky said:

i see your point but for how much longer will Britain and the rest need to rely on cables to internet. satellites will be the future soon. 

 

On 15/12/2017 at 4:33 PM, Nzo said:

There are still satellites. Governments and large institutions will still be able to communicate. Its the individual civilians that will be impacted more.

More scaremongering. There is a nation that is building their Navy and poses a real threat but its not Russia. Russia is being used because they are more salient to stupid people.

If cables were cut I would probably blame some environmental warriors before blaming a whole nation that use the internet.

And in the end would it be so bad if we all unplugged for a few months? Think of all the obesity rates that would start to fall.

 

10 hours ago, seeder said:

see...no undersea cables needed for the world and the internet to STILL work

 

https://electronics.howstuffworks.com/tv-phone1.htm

 

I suspect that satellites would be primary targets if there are future wars.

Why the next Pearl Harbor could happen in space

 

 

 

[pallidin]

Submarine Cable Map (2017)

--- excludes classified cables ---

 

https://www2.telegeography.com/submarine-cable-map

Edited December 16, 2017 by pallidin

[Unusual Tournament]

6 hours ago, stevewinn said:

Cables will remain long into the future as they represent the cheapest and fastest means of communicating. Satellites have limits nwadays the capacity of a fibre optic system can be in excess of 2 Tb/s, a tremendous amount of data, which could not easily be transmitted through Satellite communication networks. One disadvantage of satellite communications is the propagation delay.

A satellite in Geostationary orbit has to be at least 22,500 miles from the earth's surface. This means that the uplink would need to travel at least 45000 miles to reach the receiving station. Light travels at 186,000 miles per second, 45000 would be equivalent to 250ms delay on its outward route, and a further 250ms delay on its return. Half a second may be a short time in your lifetime, but an IP packet needs a much faster response. Satellite communication is not the answer to your problems, however most applications nowadays need the much faster response of a fibre optic cable. Typically propagation across the 3,500 miles of an Atlantic cable system is less than 15ms.

 

 

you sound like you've read a lot up on this. my views are based more on my interests in start-ups from Europe and the states like oneworld and spacex, that want to capitalise on the information boom in auto automation and AI by flooding space with satellites providing 100% internet coverage to the world. as technology develops and space travel becomes more the domain of companies and less governments it will be cheaper and more robust than cables and less infrastructure intensive.  

[pallidin]

Just a muse comment...

"Flat-earther's" might say "why don't we just microwave from NYC to London?"

[_KB_]

21 hours ago, Captain Risky said:

i see your point but for how much longer will Britain and the rest need to rely on cables to internet. satellites will be the future soon. 

true enough