Fourth undersea cable cut near UAE, suspicions rise

For the fourth time in a week, an undersea communications cable has apparently been cut (or "failed due to a power outage," as some sources suggest), and while no official reports of subversion have surfaced just yet, things are beginning to get suspicious. Flag Telecom, a subsidiary of Indian conglomerate Reliance ADA Group, has had two cables damaged in the span of a week -- a quandary it has never dealt with until now. As it stands, traffic from the Middle East and surrounding areas is being routed through various other cables in an attempt to remain online, but any more snips and we could be dealing with ping times eerily similar to those seen in 1993 (or much, much larger issues).

[Image courtesy of DivingCo]

[Dorf @ Feb 5th 2008 11:41AM]

I bet it is sea mynocks chewing on the cables.

[CraigJ @ Feb 5th 2008 12:17PM]

IDK, it's a long way from the asteroid fields of Hoth to Earth. Do Mynocks have hyperdrive?

[andy @ Feb 5th 2008 12:27PM]

No need for hyperdrive, just klingon.


BOOOOOOOOOOO!

I know, I know.

[brian peppers @ Feb 5th 2008 1:16PM]

It was Brian Peppers

[Sam @ Feb 5th 2008 2:36PM]

its al queda! damn osama!!!!

[WillisOGeeky @ Feb 5th 2008 3:41PM]

Chupa Cabra

[Dr. Evil @ Feb 5th 2008 3:41PM]

Actually it was me.

I plan on holding the Internet hostage for ... ONE MILLION DOLLARS!!!

[Anthony @ Feb 5th 2008 11:41AM]

When the third line cut was reported I started to think this was more than just a ship dragging its anchor. Now with a fourth I'm just waiting on the report that says who and why.

[prateeko @ Feb 5th 2008 12:08PM]

Exactly. First time is an accident. Second time as a coincidence. Third time it's a conspiracy.

So what does that make the fourth time - profit???

[merf1350 @ Feb 5th 2008 12:09PM]

It was American Tech Support, getting revenge for all the outsourcing.

[Kamokazi @ Feb 5th 2008 12:25PM]

This one was not actually cut, it failed due to a power outage:

http://www.arabianbusiness.com/510132-internet-problems-continue-with-fourth-cable-break?ln=en
"the problem is related to the power system and not the result of a ship's anchor cutting the cable, as is thought to be the case in the other three incidents."

The others were probably damaged in the earthquake...and it's probably just a conincidencea that this one experienced a power failure. (or is it?...)

[Andir3.0 @ Feb 5th 2008 2:26PM]

For all we know, it could just be that they changed shipping lanes and there's more traffic over the lines than there was before. Conspiracies are nice, but not always true.

[teej @ Feb 5th 2008 3:00PM]

al qaeda's in ur sea, cutting ur cables.

[Sporkinum @ Feb 5th 2008 4:18PM]

Replace al qaeda with NSA. Al Qaeda couldn't do that if it were in a 10 meter deep pond.

[m @ Feb 5th 2008 6:35PM]

i think al queda could easily do it, but why would they cut off their own internet? a cave gets really boring, really fast.

[Harbinger @ Feb 5th 2008 6:04PM]

Seriously, these continuing Cloverfield viral ads are getting ridiculous.

[CowAssasin @ Feb 6th 2008 1:17PM]

Has anyone sure the Martian Bigfoot is still on Mars? He may have grown gills so he can refill his Energon Cubes without being bothered.

[Phil Perman @ Feb 5th 2008 11:41AM]

Before all the conspiracy theories start rolling in, it might be worth pointing out there was an earthquake measuring 4.7 under the med on the day the first 2 cables went down, and theres a fair possibility that the other 2 were damaged in that incident and have only recently failed.

Now that we've gotten sensibleness out of the way, the Martians did it!

[Godskitchen @ Feb 5th 2008 1:26PM]

And I suppose its not possible that governments have the tech to create earthquakes, or for that matter falsify reports of an earthquake? Like falsifying documents that said people had WMD's when they didnt?

As for the forth one being caused by a power outage, unless I was there myself I wouldnt believe it.

Even if there was an earthquake, the sea bed would have had to drop a large amount and fast for the cable to snap.

But hey if your happy to believe this isn't either some government, US or Israel, or some way for some criminal group to extort money, then great.

[tadghostal @ Feb 5th 2008 1:30PM]

What? What do earthquakes have to do with cables? Earthquakes shake from side to side, but cables are round! What a doofus. Everyone knows it's a conspiracy, why are you trying to cover it up? Hmmmmm?

[minus_273 @ Feb 5th 2008 11:42AM]

USS Jimmy Carter say Hai!

[Gremlin @ Feb 5th 2008 11:42AM]

Hate to sound like a total n00b, but what kinds of issues are we talking about here? Tons of international websites down? Really slow international websites? Generally slow communications with any server in middle east, Asia? Lots of users without internet connection in middle east, asia?

Someone help me out here.

[minus_273 @ Feb 5th 2008 11:43AM]

basically a shutdown of the net in the mideast and India (including all those outsourced call centers and IT companies)

[tadghostal @ Feb 5th 2008 1:36PM]

What this means is that any time you have to call for tech support, and it comes from "overseas", the normally crisp, clear voice data that these lines normally carry could become corrupted. The end user would notice this in various ways. It could, for instance, make it very difficult to understand the tech support person - as though they had a very thick un-american accent.

[pokstad @ Feb 5th 2008 2:19PM]

You would only receive poor quality calls if the call centers are using voip, if they are using plain old telephone service, then the result would be refused calls ("We're sorry, but you're call cannot be completed...").

[172pilot @ Feb 5th 2008 2:27PM]

Well, since we know the Internet us just about p0rn, I guess it just means that you'll have to wait by the mailbox for your issue of "hot girls in veils" in written form this month, since the online version isnt going to be available..

[Erek @ Feb 5th 2008 5:00PM]

reply to Pokstad:

Modern phone switching isn't that simple. POTS phone companies lease data service on fiber lines, or in some cases they're owned by the same companies. So voice data ends up carried on the same physical cables as IP data.

I'd love to hear how international voice service has been affected, but there hasn't been much discussion on the issue.

[PDCant @ Feb 5th 2008 11:42AM]

Middle East internet traffic is now conveniently routed through the U.S./U.K./AT&T spy system. Well, convenient for the NSA, anyway. Sounds like a plan!

[minus_273 @ Feb 5th 2008 11:49AM]

At&T spy system haha i want aware they ran one. Have you been drinking the koolaid much?

[Cal @ Feb 5th 2008 11:59AM]

The NSA has access at AT&T

[Rob @ Feb 5th 2008 12:17PM]

They should use Comcast's internet network instead. Comcast has been able to mess around with their customers' connection and filter their traffic as well.

[philoneous @ Feb 5th 2008 12:48PM]

@minus-273, please read:
http://www.eff.org/nsa

[tadghostal @ Feb 5th 2008 1:39PM]

NSA *IS* AT&T! Few people realize this, but if you reverse the letters in NSA, then replace the resulting "SN" with "T&T", you get....AT&T!!!! coinkydink? I think not.

[Xee @ Feb 5th 2008 11:48AM]

You're all wrong. Obviously it was USOs.

[Tyler @ Feb 5th 2008 11:50AM]

Internet Pirates? har har har

[Michael Marquez @ Feb 5th 2008 11:51AM]

Cloverstan

[Mihir @ Feb 5th 2008 11:52AM]

i'm pretty sure this has to be Bush's fault.

or global warming.

or terrorists.

or......CRAB PEOPLE, CRAB PEOPLE!

[andy @ Feb 5th 2008 12:00PM]

It's terrorists forced by global warming to set off earthquakes (like in that one James Bond movie, A view to a kill), which we all know is Bush's fault.

[tadghostal @ Feb 5th 2008 1:43PM]

I'm still bitter that NO ONE blames anything on El Niño any more :(

[Good_Bytes @ Feb 5th 2008 2:00PM]

It could be a country doing some tests before engaging in a war...
No Internet -> harder to communicate events.

Pretty smart (but i am totally against it), specially that today we are all so depended on the Internet.

[MBS @ Feb 5th 2008 4:25PM]

El Niño is Bush's fault!

[kodey @ Feb 5th 2008 11:54AM]

I said stuff like this would start happening if we let the Japanese hunt whales -- but did anybody listen? No.

It's the whales people...and it's war.

[Karl Viklund @ Feb 5th 2008 11:56AM]

1993??????????????????
Like someone had Internet back then...

[Denver_80203 @ Feb 5th 2008 12:03PM]

Yes, 1993. Crappy perfomance? Yes. But still it was actually useful.

[Superprime @ Feb 5th 2008 12:09PM]

I did. Does your calendor show september Karl?

[Naomi @ Feb 5th 2008 2:17PM]

I did, and I was 10 years old. I was on usenet, looking for game genie codes for my SNES.

[Yarbo @ Feb 14th 2008 3:57PM]

I did, and so do many people I know. In 1993, I was 9, but my father is in the IT business, so for as long as I can remember i've had access to the interwebz...

[Tom W @ Feb 5th 2008 11:56AM]

So does this mean I won't get any more spam from those areas? :)

[Karl Viklund @ Feb 5th 2008 11:57AM]

Like it matters where spam comes from.

[ethana2 @ Feb 5th 2008 3:12PM]

Spam comes from a lot of places. We may just have to cut the cables to microsoft's update servers to compensate for the drop. ^_^

..Who would have thought that adherence to open standards would create four operating systems better than windows? Ironic, isn't it? I love POSIX.