The heated US-China cable competition under the seas
Vital for data transmission and communications between continents, lines are vulnerable to sabotage and a stage for global power rivalry
Last week, eight US senators urged President Joe Biden to order a security review of the global network of undersea communications cables, citing the “threat of sabotage” by Russia – and China.
It was just the latest expression of US concern over China’s potential espionage in handling network traffic, an accusation Beijing has repeatedly rejected.
Usually running along the bed of the world’s seas, undersea cables are the backbone of the global internet for daily communications.
About 95 per cent of the US population and nearly 75 per cent of China’s use data that is transferred through undersea cables, and the number is growing.
As global powers jockey for technological and economic supremacy, undersea cables are increasingly at the centre of the competition.
Here are five things to know about the undersea information network, and what it means to the US-China relationship.
What are undersea cables?
Undersea cables, also called submarine cables, are fibre optic cables laid on the seabed between land-based stations. They carry up to 99 per cent of internet traffic between continents and are vital for transmission of data, from personal email, online shopping to scientific research.
Financial transactions on platforms like banking networks, like Swift, as well as fintechs and blockchains also depend on data traffic through the cables.
The first undersea cable was laid in 1850 between France and Britain, and as of September, there were 532 active undersea cable systems, with another 77 planned, according to telecommunications research company Telegeography.