Sheez. Are ships anchors capable of dropping down 6500 feet even? :dubious:
To be fair, we don’t know how deep the ocean is where the cable break is. It might be quite shallow. Wikipedia states that the average depth of the Red Sea is only about 1600 feet deep, though the central trench can be as deep as 8200 feet. So basically, I have no idea whether a ship’s anchor could reach deep enough.
But to curtail (or enhance, depending) the conspiracy theorists out there- it’s got to be a real bitch to get far enough down to cut one of those cables. I suspect it would take a whole lot more know-how and equipment than your basic terrorists hiding in a cave would have.
I would think that if someone cut the cable to install a tap elsewhere, the tap should be detectable. I don’t know if you can tap into an optical cable without causing a drop in power, which should be detectable.
Anyway, if it was done intentionally, it wouldn’t have to be as a prelude to war. It could be economic sabotage by any number of interests, or something done to disrupt communications temporarily so that some operation could be carried out. Or even as a test by a malevolent government to see how quickly communications can be restored and how much chaos is caused, so that they can include it in war planning in the future.
It wouldn’t have to be the U.S. or the IDF doing this. You can’t rule out Russians, Chinese, France, or really any economic power with the ability to do it and interests in the region. Since we don’t know why it was done (if it is in fact not just a serious of coincidences), we can’t really guess who could have been behind it.
Sharks. Lasers on heads. Whaddaya need, a road map?
Tectonic activity, but I’d expect that to show on seismic monitors. There are other explanations… that’s all I was saying.
I don’t wear tin foil hats - as a rule. 
Well, obviously you’d have that, but that’s why they cut the cable. First you cut them somewhere, then you put in a tap somewhere else down the line, so nobody’ll be the wiser. Between this conjecture and my penchant for conspiracy, I can’t see any other possible explanation for this whole business.
Wouldn’t it be possible to set up an amplifier ( or whatever the term would be in optics ) downstream of the signal splitter, to boost the power back up ?
It also occurs to me that any tapping need not have been done underwater; only the cutting part. Perhaps to extend the time it takes to do the repairs.
These are long haul high capacity data links. What do you suppose needs to be tapped exactly? Most of this internet traffic runs in the clear. If they are using encryption…well, then it’s encrypted. Regardless if you were going to attempt to capture the data streams the bottom of the ocean isn’t exactly necessary to do so. You could tap in at any of the peering sites much easier. Hell, if I wanted to do the research and find out where the border routers were between the ISP peers I could probably tap the traffic (for a few seconds before it overwhelmed my systems) from HERE.
They there is the why…WHY would the government want to tap in there? What would they gain? Think they will intercept sooper sekrit emails from AQ? And that they can only tap into those sooper sekrit emails from the bottom of the ocean?
-XT
I have no idea what kind of traffic is on those cables. I had assumed there could also be fibers with 20,000 voice channels on them in that bundle.
Again, the tap wouldn’t have to be done where the break is - you cut the cable so that no one can detect the process of installing the tap - which could be done anywhere.
It’s been a couple of decades since I studied optical transmission, so I have no idea what kind of equipment is available for detecting splices, amplifying signals, etc.
If someone is doing this deliberately, they’re doing it damned fast; especially if taps or gates are installed.
Four cables in a week at different locations would likely strain even the nefarious Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure.
The Federation of American Scientists produced an interesting article which covers tapping of submarine cables:
Interception Capabilities 2000
The USS Parche was decommissioned in 2004, and her mission taken on by the USS Jimmy Carter.
Not surprisingly, I’m not finding any information online regarding the current location of the Jimmy Carter, or her sister boats.
I don’t know why you are being so facetious in dismissing this. Several people have pointed out that cutting the cable at one point would give you cover to tap it in another without detection. As to your childish “sooper sekrit” emails, the U.S. is monitoring all networks it has access to, i.e. American controlled networks. The internet is the most secure and easiest way for Al Qaeda and others to communicate. I’m sure our intelligence agencies would love to have the ability to mine all internet traffic traveling in or out of the ME.
If someone is really tapping this lines, there’s a 99.9% chance it’s the U.S. or Israel.
Yeah…I know. I’m a network engineer. The point is that the US gubberment doesn’t need to cut the cables and put in a wire tap on the bottom of the ocean to do all that stuff. You don’t have to be in the layer 1 link to capture traffic, ehe? The problem isn’t tapping in…it’s the volume of data you need to sift through, even data in the clear.
You really think you need to tap the links to sniff the traffic??
:dubious: If someone actually cut these cables in order to put in a sooper sekrit wire tap it’s nearly 100% chance that it was neither the US nor Israel…who wouldn’t need to do that in order to sniff that traffic. IF someone did it I would expect it to be someone with a lot less sophisticated cyber capabilities and team.
Personally, IF some cut the cable IMHO their goal was to disrupt the traffic and cause chaos. That is the mostly like Occam’s Razor type explanation. If you want to persist in a CT about the NSA or CIA or some other shadowy organization in the US gubberment cutting several cables at once to put in a tap that they don’t need…well, that is your look out.
-XT
Agreed.
Ok you are going to have to fight my ignorance here. How could the U.S. capture the traffic going across these cables?
Who do you think cut these cables? Egypt says that there were no ships in the area, so if they were cut it would have to have been done by sub. No terrorist organization has submarines, and even if they did I would be shocked if they could get into the Mediterranean without detection. You can say the same thing for Iran, and besides, what do they gain by cutting off their own internet for two weeks?
Why would you say that? Russia has all kinds of interests in the region. As does France. They both have worries about Islamic terrorism. They have more economic ties to the region than the U.S. does. Russia has recently shown itself to be more than willing to engage in things like internet sabotage.
And I wouldn’t rule out al-Qaida. No, they don’t have the ability to install a tap, but would they gain from economic instability in the region? How hard would it be to cut those lines? I really have no idea. It sounds like it might be beyond their capabilities, but I’m not sure.
It could also be someone like Hezbollah, or one of any number of factions in the middle east, including some militaries - like Egypt’s, which has already shown its willingness to go ‘rogue’ on the waters of the region and act without the permission of the state.
xtisme: How certain are you of what kind of traffic is on those lines? Perhaps there voice channels and video channels and other interesting stuff that’s not internet traffic. If it’s optical, and it’s been optical from the source to the destination, then the only way to sniff it is to physically splice the cable, so far as I know.
But really, this is all rampant speculation. None of us really has a clue what’s going on. So far it all looks like big mystery.
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Russia and France have been pretty buddy buddy with Iran and Syria, while the United States invaded one country in the region, and is rattling sabers at another. Russia and France aren’t anywhere as concerned as the U.S. is about Islamic terrorist or Iran getting nukes. Hell, Russia is selling a nuclear reactor to Iran. For Russia to do this, they would have had to get a submarine into the Mediterranean and the Persian gulf without being detected. Something that I seriously doubt is possible.
These cut cables haven’t really had any adverse effect on the economies in the region. Besides, in order for Al Qaeda to cut these cables they would need at minimum a ship, and much more likely a submarine given Egypt’s announcement. I don’t think they have either.
The fact that some of the cables cut were in the Persian Gulf pretty much rules these two out.
You’re really reaching here. The U.S. is the sole superpower left, and they are the ones driving the coalition against Iran. If these cables were really cut for intelligence, it’s going to be the U.S. that is behind it.
I realize that we are in tin hat territory here, and I’m not usually a conspiracy guy. But 4 cables happening to go down in a short period of time and the fact that they service a volatile region is pinging on my implausibility meter.
As I said, there’s no reason to assume that any tap is being installed below water.
Because they want to listen in one everyone.
What makes you think they care about Al Qaeda ? More likely, they’d be doing keyword searches to detect things like liberals, atheists, environmentalists, and Democrats, or those who support them. If American; another country would look for another set of political enemies.
And I find apparent beliefs about the regard our government has for people’s privacy amusing. They already spy on our own people.
I actually don’t disagree with you. If the cables were cut intentionally, I’d probably put good money on U.S. intelligence being the culprit. It’s just that my level of certainty isn’t anywhere the 99% that you have that the U.S. would be involved. There are a few big players on the world stage who could do this, and the U.S. is only one of them. And Russia has recently shown its willingness to play hardball.
But really, it’s all just speculation.