RE: Sicily to Egypt undersea cable disruption

[<andrew2 () one net>]

Martin Hannigan wrote:
> On Feb 1, 2008 2:25 PM, Ahmed Maged (amaged) <amaged () cisco com> wrote:
> > "Does look normal to me" is far from a global conspiracy theory.
> >
> >
> > Thank you for the translation but I think you got it wrong.
>
>
> I agree, there should be a sanity check as I understand that they are
> within close proximity of each other. Two ships slipping anchors and
> causing cable breaks in the same area is odd, but if there's a storm
> in the area, that would not be that much of a surprise. There should
> be some logic to the madness.
>
> I think that the moral of the story is that "more" operators should
> try to better understand what diversity means beyond the metro. The
> challenge is getting the information. The Teleography series of
> internet/sub maps are interesting.  They don't demonstrate diversity
> though, since they show figurative routing. Those nice and straight
> lines are a pipe dream.
>
> -M<
>
>
>
>
> -M<



> Well, when you have all these cables running through narrow straits or
> converging to the same stretch of beach, it does not strike me as at
> all extraordinary.  
>
> An important factor is cooperation. Is there cooperation between the
> fiber optic guys and fishing associations to minimize hits? 
>
> I would wager there is close to zero.
>
> Roderick S. Beck


Wouldn't that be a pretty narrow tightrope to walk from a
security standpoint?  The undersea cable maps are deliberately vague,
specifically to try to avoid making them easy targets of terrorism. 
Which is the bigger threat?  Boat anchors and fishing nets because of
inaccurate maps or deliberate sabotage because of accurate maps?  I
guess you pick your poison.    

Andrew

...don't we rehash these same issues every time there's an undersea cable
failure?