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Today's Topics:

   1. Undersea cables (Gordon Lennox)
   2. Re: Undersea cables (Julius ter Pelkwijk)
   3. Re: Undersea cables (Jim Reid)


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Message: 1
Date: Tue, 5 Dec 2017 19:35:17 +0100
From: Gordon Lennox <gordon.lennox.13@gmail.com>
To: Cooperation WG <cooperation-wg@ripe.net>
Subject: [cooperation-wg] Undersea cables
Message-ID: <9FE1E343-ECD0-42CE-9B7E-03F731903423@gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;       charset=utf-8

A new report on an old problem.

<<  We must do more to protect the indispensable yet insecure internet infrastructure provided by undersea cables, urges Rishi Sunak MP in a new report published by Policy Exchange, Undersea Cables: Indispensable, insecure.

97% of global communications and $10 trillion in daily financial transactions are transmitted not by satellites in the skies, but by cables lying deep beneath the ocean. Undersea cables are the indispensable infrastructure of our time, essential to our modern life and digital economy, yet they are inadequately protected and highly vulnerable to attack at sea and on land, from both hostile states and terrorists.

US intelligence officials have spoken of Russian submarines ?aggressively operating? near Atlantic cables as part of its broader interest in unconventional methods of warfare. When Russia annexed Crimea, one of its first moves was to sever the main cable connection to the outside world.

Undersea cables come ashore in just a few remote, coastal locations. These landing sites are critical national infrastructure but often have minimal protection, making them vulnerable to terrorism. A foiled Al-Qaeda plot to destroy a key London internet exchange in 2007 illustrates the credibility of the threat. >>

See:

https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/undersea-cables-indispensable-insecure/

And so governments must now do something?

Gordon




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Message: 2
Date: Tue, 05 Dec 2017 18:51:16 +0000
From: Julius ter Pelkwijk <pelkwijk@gmail.com>
To: Gordon Lennox <gordon.lennox.13@gmail.com>
Cc: Cooperation WG <cooperation-wg@ripe.net>
Subject: Re: [cooperation-wg] Undersea cables
Message-ID:
        <CAAiMRCT3K=_9MAL18r=jo+2CJ=JTMNKfQ23k51-McqozvmxgtQ@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"

Hi Gordon,

You mean this one?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transatlantic_communications_cable

All you need is a shovel and a big axe, and a lot of patience. If you give
me enough time I might even be able to find one of those endpoints. Yes,
the problem exists, and yes, when the internet goes slower than usual there
will be panic, but from what I know is that these "connections" are more
robust than people actually think. Its a storm in a glass of water.

Julius

On Tue, Dec 5, 2017 at 7:35 PM Gordon Lennox <gordon.lennox.13@gmail.com>
wrote:

> A new report on an old problem.
>
> <<  We must do more to protect the indispensable yet insecure internet
> infrastructure provided by undersea cables, urges Rishi Sunak MP in a new
> report published by Policy Exchange, Undersea Cables: Indispensable,
> insecure.
>
> 97% of global communications and $10 trillion in daily financial
> transactions are transmitted not by satellites in the skies, but by cables
> lying deep beneath the ocean. Undersea cables are the indispensable
> infrastructure of our time, essential to our modern life and digital
> economy, yet they are inadequately protected and highly vulnerable to
> attack at sea and on land, from both hostile states and terrorists.
>
> US intelligence officials have spoken of Russian submarines ?aggressively
> operating? near Atlantic cables as part of its broader interest in
> unconventional methods of warfare. When Russia annexed Crimea, one of its
> first moves was to sever the main cable connection to the outside world.
>
> Undersea cables come ashore in just a few remote, coastal locations. These
> landing sites are critical national infrastructure but often have minimal
> protection, making them vulnerable to terrorism. A foiled Al-Qaeda plot to
> destroy a key London internet exchange in 2007 illustrates the credibility
> of the threat. >>
>
> See:
>
>
> https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/undersea-cables-indispensable-insecure/
>
> And so governments must now do something?
>
> Gordon
>
>
>
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Message: 3
Date: Tue, 5 Dec 2017 19:40:24 +0000
From: Jim Reid <jim@rfc1035.com>
To: Gordon Lennox <gordon.lennox.13@gmail.com>
Cc: Cooperation WG <cooperation-wg@ripe.net>
Subject: Re: [cooperation-wg] Undersea cables
Message-ID: <18AEFBE1-BB4B-4E7E-BD52-F872941C72D2@rfc1035.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;       charset=us-ascii



> On 5 Dec 2017, at 18:35, Gordon Lennox <gordon.lennox.13@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> And so governments must now do something?

Well, what do you think governments (and others) should do about this? [Perhaps they already have taken precautions and aren't going to make that public for obvious reasons.] And more importantly, what is or should be the role of this WG in those actions?

FWIW these cables get damaged from time to time anyway. ISTR a few years ago a ship dropped an anchor in a rather unfortunate location in the Mediterranean and that caused interweb traffic between Europe and Asia to go via America for a few days until the cable(s) got fixed.

Most countries should have sufficient redundancy in their physical cables and landing stations. However that may not be the case for small isolated communities that are far away from where cables tend to be installed. There's always satellite as a backup I suppose.


End of cooperation-wg Digest, Vol 71, Issue 1
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