Is The Worldwide Web Under Major Threat?

The idea of a unified worldwide web is crumbling. This is due to attempts by nations such as China as well as Russia to construct national barriers. However, there is a significant transformation taking place in the internet’s physical backbone, including the fiber optic cables that span international boundaries. The common idea of a fragmented, as well as deeply divided internet, originally arose in response to China’s efforts to regulate information flow, both from outside of the nation as well as internally, culminating in the construction of the Great Firewall of China. That was accompanied by other nations eager to administer the web autonomously of the rest of the planet, increased by social media and internet shutdowns. This is remarkably simple for authorities to accomplish because every telecommunications provider relies on a license provided by the jurisdiction in which they provide services to remain in business.

The risk of failing to cooperate with a governmental mandate to halt internet flow jeopardizes the functioning of an entire nation. Internet outages are extremely difficult to manage. The internet is made up of numerous layers. And these levels being referred to, in terms of the Firewall, are digital in nature. However, the internet’s infrastructural layer, the physical connections as well as telecommunication connectivity that transmits internet data, are located beneath the digital layer. The worldwide network of underwater fiber-optic cables serves as its basic backbone. Traditionally, these cables have been managed by telecommunication firms or alliances of wireless carriers, allowing for the remarkable worldwide expansion of the internet.

What’s changed lately is that Silicon Valley behemoths have become such heavy data collectors as well as transporters, particularly between, as well as among their data centers, that they’ve begun to invest in underwater cables. This is resulting in a genuine transfer in power, in terms of international network infrastructures, since Silicon Valley behemoths such as Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, as well as several others, have far more funds to invest than conventional telecom corporations. They can afford to build underwater cables networks at a scale that dwarfs that of telecommunications corporations.

Simultaneously, national authorities such as China are financing/constructing underwater fiber-optic infrastructures to aid its economic and political objectives, in terms of solidifying its links with other nations across the world. This has ramifications across the board, particularly when it concerns cybersecurity. Geopolitics is becoming an increasingly important consideration for respective governments making strategic decisions regarding which cables should land on their coasts. Governments may be even more at ease and satisfied with infrastructures owned or run by them or their supporters than in an infrastructure operated by an economic or political adversary.