HGC Global Communications reported that a recent incident in the Red Sea led to four underwater telecom cables being cut, disrupting traffic between Asia, Europe and the Middle East, and affecting at least 25% of the internet traffic between the three regions.
While the company did not say who was responsible, Houthi rebels in Yemen have allegedly been ramping up attacks against internet cables in the Red Sea.
And telecom firms linked to Yemen's government have warned that the rebels could target submarine cables under the ocean's surface.
The Guardian newspaper estimates that the Red Sea "carries about 17% of the world's internet traffic along fiber pipes" and suggested "if the Houthis were to continually strike at internet cables, it could have catastrophic effects on the global communications industry “
And days after Yemen's government alleged that the Houthis would attack internet lines, the first disruption occurred on Feb. 24, with the "organization NetBlocks noticing internet access in the East African nation of Djibouti suffering from interruptions," The Washington Post said.
Another mystery is "how the Houthis could attack subsea cables themselves," the Post said, but the Houthis do seem to have a workaround for this.
While the cables often lie hundreds of feet below the ocean surface, "subsea cables can be cut by anchors, including those dropped from some of the ships that have been disabled in attacks," and a "drifting ship with its anchor scraping the sea could be the culprit."
And when service is cut off, telecommunications companies may be hesitant to deploy new cable lines in the region because of exorbitant costs. Due to the dangers in the Red Sea, "the cost to insure some cable ships near Yemen surged earlier this year to as much as $150,000 a day," the Wall street Journal said.
It also is not just the Middle East that could be affected; globally, underwater cables "are the invisible force driving the internet, with many funded in recent years by internet giants such as Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook parent Meta," CNN said.
However, the good news is that most of the time, there is a backup plan if a cable gets destroyed. The majority of telecom companies around the world "rely on multiple undersea cable systems, allowing them to reroute traffic in the event of an outage to ensure uninterrupted service," said CNN.
But amid Houthis continually causing problems in the Red Sea, it does not look like the region's internet issue is going away anytime soon.