Three of four undersea internet cables get cut, hasn't affected you yet

So, there's good news and bad news, and per tradition, we'll be starting with the latter. Three of four undersea cables that route internet traffic from Asia to North America have inexplicably been cut, meaning that your international Quake III server may be a bit slow this evening. The good news is that this fiasco clearly hasn't affected you yet. The AP has confirmed via Egypt's communications ministry that the cables have indeed been severed, causing massive outages in select portions of the world. Oddly, no suspicions of subterfuge have been mentioned, but we have all ideas rumors will start to swirl if another gets snipped. So, tell us readers -- are you still online? Wait, don't answer that.

[Via ZDNet]

[Zaraki Kenpachi Posted Dec 19th 2008 5:45PM]

Things are normal here in Alaska!
----
C:\Documents and Settings\user>ping engadget.com

Pinging engadget.com [66.245.3.195] with 2 bytes of data:

Reply from 66.245.3.195: bytes=2 time=5m3d6h4s280ms

[jojostar Posted Dec 19th 2008 5:50PM]

Its not any pacific cables that got cut

its the same ones got cut like 11 months ago in med

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 5:56PM]

My broadband has been much slower than usual, and i keep getting logged off of Guild Wars... is this why?

[Mr Cool711 Posted Dec 19th 2008 6:32PM]

FAIL

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 6:33PM]

One out of four? That ain't bad.

[MarkyB86 Posted Dec 19th 2008 6:38PM]

would you look at that. Does this mean no more pwnage from the nintendo homeland on mariokart tonight?

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 6:57PM]

for the conspiracy theorists:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uss_Jimmy_Carter

look for the section on tapping and splicing underwater fiber optic cables.....

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 7:11PM]

Engadget.. the new Fark

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 7:16PM]

Ok ok ... We got them message...macworld is NOT going away

[pelo Posted Dec 19th 2008 7:38PM]

How can I tell if my internet's still working?

:-)

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 7:55PM]

It's actually been affecting all of us in kuwait :(

The internet is freaking slow! I'm getting download speeds of 4 kb/s cant do anything

[kevout Posted Dec 19th 2008 7:53PM]

Wow...this is the weirdest looking shipwreck I've ever found. Better cut up a sample and bring it back to the guys at the base.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 2:33AM]

I am from Saudi Arabia and it is slow, slow and slow. I even called the ISP and they told me about the cables being cut.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 8:40PM]

learn how to use big words like subterfuge before you use them

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 29th 2008 12:02PM]

dagon is rising!!

[Rimefrost Posted Dec 19th 2008 9:07PM]

Did a little digging.. The cables cut today are the SMW4, FLAG and SMW3. SMW4 and FLAG are the same cables that were cut on January 30. It seems to be at around the same place as well, some miles from Alexandria, Egypt. Guess they did a shoddy job fixing them :-)

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 22nd 2008 1:23PM]

Cthulu strikes again!!!!!

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 19th 2008 10:42PM]

RE: subetrfuge. I do not think that word means what you think it means.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 1:39PM]

Cloverfield 2: All Yr Internets are belong to me.

[dougelo7 Posted Dec 20th 2008 2:12AM]

Oh great! THAT'S why my Internet has been crap recently - I live in Japan. I've been peaking at FREAKING 50KB/S when I PAID for a 2MB/s connection.

I am so pissed. WHO THE HELL DECIDED TO CUT THE INTERNET CABLES???!!!

[abhisheksuman Posted Dec 20th 2008 3:02AM]

I hate using the fourth cable :(

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 4:08AM]

I tell you, it's AQUAMAN! He's so mad that nobody's making video game or movies of him!

[feraligatr8 Posted Dec 20th 2008 4:36AM]

It's fine down here in Vanuatu

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 21st 2008 6:03PM]

Situation in Australia:

traffic to Africa and the mid-east is being routed via the 'Asia broadcast satellite'

traffic to Europe, Asia, and the US seems to be unaffected

[nikster Posted Dec 20th 2008 6:06AM]

How about fixing the main story now? The cables run between Asia and Europe, so the USA will only get a secondary knock-on effect when connections between those two continents are rerouted over the states... however, most internet traffic is to and from US servers so people inside the USA are generally fine in any case, and the knock-on effect will be pretty minimal.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 8:04AM]

So now all the traffic will come to US through the Europe? Cables are getting hot, the snow is melting!!! Global warming and we will all be under water!!! Easy, guys! :))

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 8:44AM]

Shit.. If Asia is disconnected. Who will run scriptkiddie attacks against my FTP server?

[stridermt2k Posted Dec 20th 2008 8:41AM]

New Jersey has enough troubles, thnks.

We're fine here...now...how are you?

[hms84 Posted Dec 20th 2008 8:42AM]

I'm in Saudi Arabia, and the I've been contacted by my ISP about the speed of the internet.
and will it's slower than the already SLOW internet

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 1:27PM]

Unfortunately your quake 3 server reference is true , I'm pinging 500+ on my regular quake server :(
This is from Mumbai.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 10:59AM]

Well I'm from Saudi Arabia and everybody here is suffering from really really slow internet connections , but we are still online

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 20th 2008 5:16PM]

About time we put Aquaman to work!

[w0kie Posted Dec 21st 2008 6:43AM]

There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 21st 2008 5:21PM]

I cut them. Sorry. Was an accident.