- Report finds five island nations completely dependent on vulnerable undersea internet cable
- The accidental anchoring of ships causes the majority of failures in submarine cables worldwide each year.
- Smaller island nations remain dangerously exposed to total nationwide internet blackouts.
A new report has highlighted how the world’s 48 island nations, including major economies such as the UK, Japan and Indonesia, rely on just 126 undersea cables for their internet connectivity.
These cables are typically no thicker than a garden hose, making them surprisingly vulnerable to accidental damage or deliberate sabotage.
The International Cable Protection Committee reports between 150 and 200 submarine cable failures each year, of which between 70 and 80% are due to accidental human activities such as anchoring, while the rest are due to technical failures, natural disasters or suspected malicious actions that are difficult to prove.
Which island nations face the greatest risk of becoming isolated?
To determine the level of vulnerability of these island nations, Comparitech analyzed three factors, including the number of cable connections, levels of fishing activity, and proximity to active armed conflicts.
The study attributed scores ranging from 0, representing the lowest risk, to 8, representing the most severe exposure.
New Zealand received a score of 0 because it has more than 10 different cables, is not involved in armed conflict, and has relatively modest industrial fishing activity.
Iceland emerged as the most at-risk European nation with an overall score of 5. Brunei and Bahrain each scored 6, making them the most vulnerable Asian island nations in the study.
Five of the smallest and least populated island nations are connected by a single undersea cable with no backup option available.
Tuvalu depends on the 668 kilometer VAKA cable, which is but one spur to a larger regional system.
The initial connection from Nauru feeds the 2,250 kilometer Eastern Micronesia cable system, which must connect with other networks to reach Guam.
Kiribati relies heavily on the 13,700 kilometer Southern Cross NEXT cable for all its connectivity needs.
All nations with a single cable are at high risk because any interruption of that cable means a total blackout for the entire country.
For example, in 2022, Tonga lost nationwide internet access for more than five weeks after an underwater volcano severed its only cable connection.
Geopolitical tensions are turning the ocean floor into a new battlefield
Growing geopolitical sensitivity around undersea cables, along with reconnaissance reports, show how these systems are increasingly being considered strategic military assets.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps recently revealed that it had mapped the locations of cables along the Strait of Hormuz, putting regional digital infrastructure at significant risk.
The UK military has tracked Russian submarines conducting surveys on cables in the North Atlantic Ocean.
China has successfully tested a cable-cutting device that works at depths of up to 4,000 meters using advanced manned and unmanned submersibles.
The vulnerability of island nations to undersea cable outages is less a question of whether outages will occur than when and how severely they will be felt.
Connectivity is highly concentrated and in some cases relies on single systems or indirect branches that offer no redundancy when problems arise.
While major economies such as the United Kingdom or Japan benefit from extensive redundancy and multiple landing points, smaller and more remote nations remain structurally exposed to total isolation.
This exposure is compounded by the difficulty of monitoring and protecting infrastructure that spans thousands of kilometers of ocean floor.
Repair fleets have just four dedicated ships worldwide, while cable ownership is concentrated in a few operators, making new systems too expensive for small nations.
Until smaller countries get alternative connections or dedicated repair vessels, they will remain a broken wire of digital darkness, a vulnerability that adversaries are already mapping.
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