Under The Sea Cable Dance [CL76]

Chris dives deep into the world of layer 1 networking and undersea cables.

Show Notes

Under The Sea Cable Dance

Episode: 76 Published: 10/03/2023

The World Is Interconnected. And That Interconnection Is Done Utilizing Long-ass Cables

Last week we touched briefly on the OSI model of understanding the different layers of networking infrastructure. Ned, being right for once, pointed out that the model is a little, shall we say, fuzzy, on the difference (and the importance of separating) some of the layers.

One thing he didn���t mention is that the OSI model is not the only model that describes networking, and that some, like the TCP model actually only has 4 layers, combining the 7 in OSI (Ed.- I did mention this, but apparently someone wasn’t paying attention). In any case, it got me to thinking; considering the cloud-first world that we live in now��� how many people really know how the lowest layers of any model work. How the hell does my computer connect to your computer, like, physically?

The answer? Mostly, long-ass cables in the ocean.

• Long Ass Cables
• Sadly no-longer-updated summary blog post about undersea cables
• Paul Barford put together a comprehensive map of just the overland and underground cables in the United States
• Well there are actually a healthy amount of discrete cables going the 4,000-odd miles from basically NYC to Europe
• The incidents in 2008 ended up knocking several countries completely offline until traffic was able to be rerouted
• During WWI, Britain cut all but one of Germany���s undersea telegraph lines, and tapped the last remaining one
• Suspicions of Russian submarines cutting undersea cables as recently as last yea
• Microsoft/Facebook-owned MAREA cable

Intro and outro music by James Bellavance copyright 2022

What is Chaos Lever Podcast?

Chaos Lever examines emerging trends and new technology for the enterprise and beyond. Hosts Ned Bellavance and Chris Hayner examine the tech landscape through a skeptical lens based on over 40 combined years in the industry. Are we all doomed? Yes. Will the apocalypse be streamed on TikTok? Probably. Does Joni still love Chachi? Decidedly not.