Re: Another cablecut - sri lanka to suez Re: Sicily to Egypt undersea cable disruption

["Steven M. Bellovin" <smb () cs columbia edu>]

On Fri, 1 Feb 2008 14:21:00 -0800
"Scott Francis" <darkuncle () gmail com> wrote:

> On Feb 1, 2008 6:37 AM, Suresh Ramasubramanian <ops.lists () gmail com>
> wrote:
> > http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/third-undersea-cable-reportedly-cut/story.aspx?guid={1AAB2A79-E983-4E0E-BC39-68A120DC16D9}
> >
> >  "We had another cut today between Dubai and Muscat three hours
> > back. The cable was about 80G capacity, it had telephone, Internet
> > data, everything," one Flag official, who declined to be named,
> > told Zawya Dow Jones.
> > The cable, known as Falcon, delivers services to countries in the
> > Mediterranean and Gulf region, he added.
>
> this (3 undersea cables in about a week, serving the same geographic
> area, with two of the cuts happening on the same day!) is leaving the
> realm of improbability and approaching the realm of conspiracy ...
>
> (either that, or the backhoe operators' union has decided there's
> better money to be made on water than on land.)

Yah.  I'm a security guy, and hence suspicious by nature -- our slogan
is "Paranoia is our Profession" -- and I'm getting very concerned.  The
old saying comes to mind: "once is happenstance, twice is coincidence,
but the third time is enemy action".  The alternative some common mode
failure -- perhaps the storm others have noted.


                --Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb