undersea cables Archives | Digital Watch Observatory

How to make submarine cables work in underserved regions

A panel at the International Submarine Cable Resilience Summit 2026 in Porto examined how economic viability and resilience intersect in efforts to extend submarine cable connectivity to underserved regions. Moderated by Aliu Yusuf Aboki, the discussion brought together development banks, regulators, and international organisations to explore how financing models, policy reforms, and partnerships can turn fragile cable projects into sustainable foundations for digital growth.

Aboki opened by stressing that resilience directly affects the economics of connectivity, influencing insurance costs, repair times, service continuity, and investor confidence. Referring to the 2024 West Africa cable outages, he warned that a single failure could trigger widespread economic disruption and derail projects already financially marginal, making resilience a prerequisite for attracting long-term investment.

German Cufré of the World Bank Group outlined how traditional financing approaches often fail in challenging markets and argued for flexible risk-sharing models that combine public and private stakeholders. He described a West African project where governments, private open-access operators, and blended finance instruments each took equal stakes, supported by in-kind public assets such as landing stations and fibre networks. Cufré also emphasised the World Bank’s insistence on wholesale open access, ensuring that publicly supported cables remain non-discriminatory, even within private consortia.

Cufré cautioned that blended finance is becoming scarcer just as demand for connectivity is surging due to AI-driven data growth. In response, he said the World Bank is exploring new tools such as a Digital Access Fund to absorb first losses and a model that allows mature cable assets to be sold to institutional investors, freeing capital for new deployments.

International Submarine Cable Resilience Summit 2026

Syed Mohammad Shaharyar Jawaid from the Islamic Development Bank announced a dedicated $250 million commitment for digital infrastructure in member states in 2026–2027, noting that many cable developers are unaware that multilateral lenders are actively seeking such projects and that digital infrastructure must be planned alongside reliable energy systems.

Lauren Bieniek of the ITU added a global perspective, citing a $1.6 trillion investment gap in digital infrastructure identified through the Digital Infrastructure Investment Catalyzer initiative. She explained that the partnership among ITU, UNCTAD, and multilateral development banks aims to move beyond diagnostics to accelerate real financing, particularly in regions where market forces alone cannot deliver resilient connectivity.

On the policy front, Rudra Narayan Palai from India’s Department of Telecommunications described reforms introduced following the adoption of the International Cable Protection Committee’s recommendations. These include faster permitting, open ownership rules, and legal recognition of cable landing stations as critical infrastructure. Palai linked these reforms to India’s rapid expansion of data centre capacity and raised questions about whether repair capabilities should rely solely on market mechanisms or require state-backed sovereign capacity, citing prolonged disruptions from Red Sea incidents.

Regional challenges were highlighted by Rodney Taylor of the Caribbean Telecommunications Union, who warned that ageing cables and heavy reliance on routes terminating in Florida expose small island states to systemic risk. He argued that resilience must be addressed regionally rather than nationally and described efforts to build local expertise through a regional school of digital transformation and South–South cooperation with West Africa.

Closing the discussion, Professor Manuel Cabugueira of Portugal’s regulator, ANACOM, presented Portugal’s vision for ‘smart cables’ that combine connectivity with climate monitoring and disaster warning, urging participants to view submarine cables as integrated systems of technology, institutions, and people essential to long-term digital resilience.

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Experts call for better protection of submarine internet cables

A high-level panel at the International Submarine Cable Resilience Summit 2026 in Porto focused on a growing paradox in global connectivity. While submarine cable damage incidents have remained relatively stable for over a decade, the time needed to repair them has increased sharply.

Moderated by Nadia Krivetz, member of the International Advisory Body for Submarine Cable Resilience, the discussion brought together government officials and industry experts who warned that longer repair times are creating new vulnerabilities for the global internet, even as undersea cable networks continue to expand rapidly.

Andy Palmer-Felgate of the International Cable Protection Committee highlighted that more than 80% of cable damage is caused by fishing and anchoring, mostly on continental shelves where maritime activity is densest. She noted that a small number of high-risk ‘problem cables’ consume around half of the world’s annual repair capacity, suggesting that targeted prevention in specific locations could significantly reduce global disruption.

Palmer-Felgate also pointed to a shift in fault patterns away from Europe and the Atlantic toward Asia, exposing weaknesses in a repair model that depends on shared, slow-to-move vessels.

New monitoring technologies were presented as part of the solution, though not without limitations. Sigurd Zhang described how distributed acoustic sensing can detect vessel activity in real time, even when ships switch off tracking systems, citing cases in which fishing fleets were invisible to conventional monitoring systems.

Eduardo Mateo added that newer optical monitoring tools can identify long-term stress and seabed instability affecting cables. Still, both speakers stressed that the cost, data complexity, and reliability requirements remain major barriers, especially for shorter cable systems.

Beyond monitoring, the panel explored improvements in cable design and installation, including stronger armouring, deeper burial, and more resilient network topologies. Mateo cautioned that technology alone cannot eliminate risk, as submarine cables must coexist with other seabed users.

Zhang noted that fully integrated ‘smart cables’ combining telecoms and scientific monitoring may still be a decade away, given the strict reliability standards operators demand.

Government coordination emerged as a decisive factor in reducing damage and speeding up repairs. South Africa’s Nonkqubela Thathakahle Jordan-Dyani described how fragmented regulations across African countries slow emergency responses and raise costs.

Speakers pointed to examples of more effective governance, including Australia’s notification-based repair system and successful legal cases described by Peter Jamieson, which have increased accountability among vessel operators and begun changing behaviour at sea.

Industry practices and skills were also under scrutiny. Jamieson argued that careful route planning and proper burial can prevent most cable faults. Still, Simon Hibbert warned that these standards depend on experienced workers whose skills are hard to replace. With an ageing maritime workforce and fewer recruits entering sea-based professions, the panel cautioned that declining expertise could undermine future cable resilience if training and knowledge transfer are not prioritised.

The discussion concluded by situating cable protection within broader economic and geopolitical pressures. Mateo pointed to supply chain risks for key materials driven by AI-related demand, while Jamieson cited regions like the Red Sea, where geopolitical instability forces cables into crowded corridors.

Despite these challenges, speakers agreed that prevention, cooperation, and shared responsibility offer a realistic path forward, stressing that submarine cable resilience can only be strengthened through sustained collaboration between governments, industry, and international organisations.

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Submarine cables keep the global internet running

The smooth functioning of the global internet depends on a largely unseen but critical system, the undersea fibre-optic cables that carry nearly all international data traffic. These cables, laid across the ocean floor, support everything from everyday online communication to global financial transactions.

Ahead of the Second International Submarine Cable Resilience Summit in Porto, Portugal, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has drawn attention to the growing importance of protecting this infrastructure.

Tomas Lamanauskas, Deputy Secretary-General of ITU, has stressed that submarine cables are the backbone of global connectivity and that their resilience must be strengthened as societies become ever more dependent on digital networks. From their origins as 19th-century telegraph lines, undersea cables have evolved into high-capacity systems capable of transmitting hundreds of terabits of data per second, forming a dense web that connects continents, economies, and communities.

Today, more than 500 commercial submarine cables stretch for roughly 1.7 million kilometres beneath the seas. Although these cables are relatively thin, their installation is complex, requiring detailed seabed surveys, environmental assessments, and specialised cable-laying vessels to ensure safe deployment and protection.

Despite their robust design, undersea cables remain vulnerable. Natural hazards such as earthquakes and underwater landslides pose risks, but around 80% of cable faults are caused by human activities, including ship anchors and fishing trawlers.

When cables are damaged, the effects can be immediate, disrupting internet access, emergency communications, financial services, and digital healthcare and education, particularly in remote or island regions.

Repairing or replacing damaged cables is often slow and costly. While faults can usually be located quickly, repairs may be delayed by complex permitting procedures and coordination across multiple jurisdictions.

With some cables installed during the dot-com boom now approaching the end of their lifespan, ITU is increasingly focused on fostering international cooperation, setting standards, and promoting best practices to ensure that these hidden networks can continue to support global connectivity in the years ahead.

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Sweden unable to determine cause of Baltic Sea cable damage

The Swedish Accident Investigation Authority (SHK) has published its final report on the damage to the C-Lion 1 subsea cable in the Baltic Sea on 18 November 2024, concluding that it cannot determine whether the incident was the result of an accident or intentional sabotage.

The investigation focused on the Chinese bulk carrier Yi Peng 3, which was initially identified as having caused the damage.

While investigators from several neighbouring countries, including Sweden, were allowed to board the vessel, the SHK reported that the visit was time-constrained and that access to key evidence—such as surveillance footage and the vessel’s Voyage Data Recorder—was not granted.

Interviews with the crew were conducted in the presence of Chinese officials.

The SHK outlined two possible scenarios: one in which the anchor was deliberately released to damage seabed infrastructure, and another in which it detached due to improper security.

The report noted that certain technical details—such as the absence of damage to key anchor components—make the accidental scenario less likely, but acknowledged that neither hypothesis could be confirmed due to investigative limitations.

Under international maritime law, flag states typically lead investigations in international waters, though exceptions may apply in cases involving suspected criminal activity.

While some analysts have raised concerns about potential state-sponsored sabotage, officials from several European countries have indicated increasing confidence that the recent cable breaks were not the result of coordinated or intentional activity.

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Keppel and Sovico plan undersea cables to link Vietnam and Singapore, sources say

Singaporean asset manager Keppel and Vietnam’s Sovico Group are in discussions to develop undersea fibre-optic cables aimed at boosting Southeast Asia’s data centre industry. The potential $150 million project would directly link Vietnam with Singapore, a critical regional hub for data infrastructure. However, talks remain fluid, with Keppel reportedly favouring a larger consortium-led project extending from Singapore to Japan, while Sovico supports a direct connection.

The discussions highlight Southeast Asia’s growing demand for AI services and internet capacity, with Vietnam planning 10 new submarine cables by 2030. These cables are also a focal point in the ongoing US-China tech rivalry, with the United States lobbying against the involvement of Chinese contractors, citing security concerns. US officials have reportedly briefed Sovico and other stakeholders on the risks of working with China’s HMN Technologies.

Vietnam, with a rapidly growing digital economy and a population nearing 100 million, currently relies on five undersea cable branches for global connectivity. Expanding its cable infrastructure is seen as key to establishing itself as a regional data hub, despite challenges like power shortages and stringent data regulations. Keppel and Sovico’s efforts, along with other planned projects, signal significant investment in the region’s digital future.

Eighteen nations endorse the statement on undersea cables security and resilience during the UN General Assembly

At the 79th annual UN General Assembly, 18 nations, including the United States, Australia, Canada, the European Union, and several Pacific nations, endorsed a joint statement addressing the security and resilience of undersea cable infrastructure. The statement highlights the indispensable role of these cables and underscores the pressing need to safeguard them against emerging threats, both natural and manufactured.

Earlier this year, undersea data cables in the Red Sea reportedly were damaged, and large parts of West and Central Africa were left without internet services in March 2024 because of failures on four of the fibre optic cables that run below the world’s ocean. The joint statement begins by acknowledging communications networks’ central role in modern society, with undersea cables being critical infrastructure for global data transmission.

The nations stress that the rapid expansion of undersea cable networks has led to greater interdependence among countries, making the protection of this infrastructure a priority. They advocate for adopting policies to ensure that the infrastructure remains efficient, secure, resilient, and redundant to mitigate risks posed by its vulnerability.

The joint statement outlines key principles for a unified global approach to securing undersea cable infrastructure, focusing on building resilient and secure systems while incorporating cybersecurity best practices. Nations highlighted the importance of promoting secure cable providers, improving government-industry coordination, providing transparent ownership, and emphasising careful planning to prevent disruptions. Additionally, they outlined the need to consider regular risk assessments and compliance with international laws.

Vietnam faces US-China rivalry over undersea cable expansion

The United States is pushing Vietnam to avoid using Chinese firm HMN Technologies in its plan to build 10 new undersea cables by 2030, amid concerns over national security and sabotage. Vietnam’s current cables, essential for global internet connectivity, have suffered repeated failures, prompting the government to prioritise new projects.

Washington is lobbying Hanoi to select more experienced and trusted suppliers for the cables, citing concerns about espionage and security threats linked to HMN Technologies, which the US views as associated with Chinese tech giant Huawei. The US has also raised concerns about possible sabotage of Vietnam’s current subsea cables.

Vietnamese authorities have remained open to working with Chinese firms, but United States officials have stressed that choosing HMN Tech could discourage American companies from investing in Vietnam. Meanwhile, Vietnam’s top telecoms company, Viettel, is already planning a cable with Singapore, bypassing disputed waters in the South China Sea.

The US and China are vying for influence in Vietnam as the Southeast Asian nation looks to expand its undersea cable infrastructure. Both countries are heavily invested in Vietnam, with subsea cables becoming a critical element in the broader US-China technology rivalry.

Can undersea cables detect earthquakes?

Undersea cables carry internet traffic across continents. They are part of the critical information infrastructure of the modern world.

Scientists started using these cables as a global network of sensors that monitor seismic and other changes at the seabed, previously beyond the reach of the scientific community.

As Wired indicated in the recent coverage

Where there’s cable, there’s potential data.

Undersea cables could also be used as early-warning tools for earthquakes and tsunami as they can detect any tectonic shifts on the seabed.

Source: Undersea Cables are carrying scientific secrets