The Role of Submarine Cables in Global Internet Reachability

-

 


In June-2024, Pakistan went through some major online hiccups because some important underwater wires got busted. The big ones that hit the skids were these two cables called SMW4 and AAE-1. That SMW4 wire, which is super important for the world's internet, got messed up in June and fixing it was a big job. Then came August, and the AAE-1 started to give headaches too. All this trouble knocked down the internet strength by about 1.75 terabits per second. Yeah, that made using the net in Pakistan pretty slow, and it wasn't easy getting online.

Traffic jams on the web got bad when everyone was online at the same time making it tough to get to stuff we need. The online stuff had to go down different digital roads, yet that didn't quite fix the whole problem. Getting everything back to normally took a bunch of months, and they didn't finish fixing the SMW4 until way later in 2024.

Plus, things like DDoS attacks and messing up the big internet service providers' settings made the web even sadder. To patch up these weak spots for next time, Pakistan says it's going to lay down some new undersea wires and beef up its net stuff. Full restoration of services was achieved by November 2024.



Submarine Cables: Critical for Worldwide Internet Connectivity

An invisible network of infrastructure submarine cables is central to the smooth operation of the internet. These ocean-floor cables deliver most of the planet's data forming the core of cross-continental communication. Let's dive into why they're so crucial, with each theme broken down:

1. Unpacking Submarine Cables

Submarine cables, which are fiber-optic lines dropped along the ocean's bottom, link lands and nations. Their ability to move terabytes upon terabytes of information every second supports web browsing, phone chats, and transferring different kinds of data. Stretching for miles under the sea, these lines are tough enough to handle the rough underwater world.


Fig :1 Architecture of Sub Marine cable

2. Submersibles Wires: The Key to Worldwide Connection

• Sending Info: Ocean bottom wires are vital cause they carry more than 95% of our global data making a must-have for internet availability.

• Quickness and Results: These undersea wires zap data way faster with less waiting than satellites. That's super for stuff that needs to happen now, like video calls and stock market stuff.

• Savings in the Wallet: When it comes to sending heaps of data far using wires under the ocean saves a ton of cash compared to space gear.


Fig :2 Global Map of Sub Marine Cable 

3. Big Deal for Countries

• Economic Influence: Nations with strong "submarine cable" connectivity stand a better chance to play a part in the worldwide online economy.

• Security of the Nation: Lots of governments see these "submarine cable" networks as super important for their infrastructure. They're key for comms in defense and doing cyber stuff.

• Influence Globally: Having power over the paths these cables take can give a country some serious perks, both money-wise and strategy-wise.

4. Problems "Submarine Cables" Have to Deal With

• Prone to Getting Wrecked: Natural disasters, fishing, and boat anchors often wreck submarine cables. Take the internet mess in Pakistan in 2024. The SMW4 and AAE-1 cables broke messing everything up.
 
• Crazy Expensive to Fix: Fixing these underwater cables isn't cheap. You need special boats, and it takes ages—meanwhile, people are stuck with crummy internet.

• Trouble Over Who's Boss: People fighting over who owns these cables or trying to wreck them on purpose can make the internet go poof in some places.

5. The Next Big Thing for Underwater Cables

• Bigger Capacity: They're crafting new cables to manage the skyrocketing demand for data.

• Improved Stuff: The cable makers do their thing making them tough enough to take on the elements.

• Mixed Fixes: If we throw submarine cables and satellites into a pot and mix up, we get this super tough worldwide web thingy.

6. People Making Waves: When Stuff Gets Messed Up

• Financial Hurdles: The 2024 submarine cable issue gave Pakistan a tough time with less internet bandwidth messing up businesses and key operations.
 
• Community Troubles: A ton of people had a rough time getting on social media, stuff for remote jobs, and, like simple internet things.

• Ways to Dodge Problems: It’s important to have different paths and extra cables to stop this kind of headache from happening again.


Wrap-up

Submarine cables serve as the modern internet's arteries letting us chat across the world with no sweat. As we rely more on digital stuff, we got to pour more resources into these critical cables to protect more. Making sure we've got strong and backup-loaded submarine cable networks is to be super important for creating a digital world that bounces back and includes everyone.






Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

AI in NOC: A New Era for Capacity Planning and Network Management

-
Image
   Introduction :- Predicting router interface traffic in modern network management is critical to achieve optimal network performance, resource allocation, and proactively eliminate bottlenecks. This case study suggests using machine learning on network datasets to develop a model that predicts an actual router’s interface traffic versus an ideal router’s traffic. By evaluating historical data of network traffic and utilizing well-established machine learning API-based algorithms like Neural Networks, Decision Trees, and Ensemble Methods, this analysis reviews the formation possibilities of a strong prediction model with grand accuracy. At the end of the study, this paper reviews multiple factors and features related to the traffic in the interface such as the hour in the day, the day’s sequence in the week, the network protocol, the application, and the structure of the network. Additionally, it explores the machine learning algorithms to compare the accuracy of the ML model...
Read more

Basics of Multiprotocol Label Switching

-
Image
  Objective := Fast switching of packet. Load-balancing traffic. Segregation of traffic is possible customer wise in MPLS. MPLS as a 2.5 layer protocol :       MPLS works on VPN type technology.     It works on layer 2.5 OSI model.   0       MPLS header added and inserted between layer 2 (Data link layer) and layer 3 (Network layer) It   is also known as “shim” Protocol. Label : 20 bits label value is used and it takes any values from 0 to 1048575. Experimental : 3 bits used for experimental and it generally used for Qos Service. QoS Policy :- Stack :  I t’s 1 bit long . Either 0 or 1. TTL :  It’s size 8 bit long. It generally defined as how packet reach from source to destination. its value is decreased by one at each hop to prevent packet to get stuck in  network. RTT (Round trip time)  = RTL (Time require to reach packet from source to destination) + RTA  (Time require to reach packe...
Read more

Traffic engineering: An attractive feature of MPLS

-
Image
  MPLS  technology: - n   MPLS is working on “Push—Swap—POP” methodology. n   PUSH : iLER--- (ingress Label Edge router) – add Label at the edge of router. it is done by PE router. n   SWAP : Label swapping – Label is swapped between P routers. LSP (Label Switched Path) is used to forward packet from Source to destination.   Labels are Swapped between these P routers and built between border PE routers. n   POP : eLER--- (Egress Label Edge router) – it is used to remove label.   But sometimes label removal process is done before the edge of last PE router, last P router which is called as PHP (Penultimate HOP Popping). M PLS Label  Mechanism: - -           Basically, two labels are used in  MPLS.   1.       Transport label 2.       Service label   1.       Transport Label:-   ...
Read more