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Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

thehill.com

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Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#51

Post by ris »

nugi wrote: post #34
telekid wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, really? That’s shocking to me - I would have assumed the entire link was encrypted E2E. Are there technical limitations that make this infeasible?

Imagine the hardware required to encrypt that much data on the fly... not so shocking anymore is it?

Considering that AMD processors now have the streaming encryption capacity to encrypt data as it travels to and from the memory controller, I think we're at a point where performing high bandwidth symmetric encryption is not significantly more expensive than the existing encoding/transport costs.

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#52

Post by Pyxl101 »

ris wrote: post #51
nugi wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine the hardware required to encrypt that much data on the fly... not so shocking anymore is it?

Considering that AMD processors now have the streaming encryption capacity to encrypt data as it travels to and from the memory controller, I think we're at a point where performing high bandwidth symmetric encryption is not significantly more expensive than the existing encoding/transport costs.

Indeed. It seems like we ought to be able to do encryption in hardware at arbitrary speeds without a lot of cost by this point. (No?)

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#53

Post by jacquesm »

anonymfus wrote: post #47
stctgion wrote: post #45

Anyone know the specifics of how you actually intercept data on a fibre optic cable?

You just clean and bend the fibre it until enough light escapes for you to detect.

Not so simple at the bottom of the ocean and working with pressurized cables, besides the fact that the data will most likely be encrypted at the link level.

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#54

Post by tpudlik »

cm2187 wrote: post #37

I believe that until recently neither Azure or AWS had a datacenter in the UK. Cutting undersea cables between the UK and the US / Europe / Ireland could have some serious consequences in the UK, at the very least on the economy, possibly on its infrastructure (payment systems, communications, etc). But aren't terrestrial cables more vulnerables than undersea cables? Cutting undersea cables require sophisticated tech…

There is much more redundancy in terrestrial cables (because they are vastly cheaper to lay), so they're much less of a single point of failure.

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#55

Post by 3pt14159 »

gcb0 wrote: post #49

and how do you exfiltrate the data? if you can tap on petabytes/s of data with your probe, how can you move that data for analysis or how can you decrypt it in real time in case you only want to retransmit portions of it?

You should read the Snowden papers (or was this some other leak? I’m getting so confused by all the leaking). They have two methods: first a device at the location dumps most of the traffic they don’t need like porn or torrents. The remaining data can be reencoded to look like normal https or ssh or whatever and sent through a third cable to another main network location. The data can also be stored locally and retrieved.

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#56

Post by CurtMonash »

cfghcrtyd wrote: post #44
gtcode wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's indicative of the stark cultural contrast between USA and Russia, indeed: https://www.si.com/nfl/2017/01/23/vladimir-putin-robert-kraf...

In some ways, the story of someone getting ripped off like that leaves the victim with a better story for themselves than simply being a guy who has four super bowl rings even though he doesn't actually play football. Which is not to applaud theft, but rather to highlight the unsympathetic qualities of the victim.

Robert Kraft was in the headlines (e.g. atop CNN.com) for two days when that happened.

How may CEOs get that sort of public attention and have it be FAVORABLE? It was an enormous PR win for him.

And then the ass had to go support his buddy Donald Trump ... :(

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#58

Post by indubitable »

stctgion wrote: post #45

Anyone know the specifics of how you actually intercept data on a fibre optic cable?

I would not assume the intention is to intercept data. Assuming this is accurate, it could be tactical repositioning given recent events. Some seem to think that Trump might actually take action in North Korea. If he does, that's going to radically escalate tensions between the US and China/Russia - both of whom border North Korea, and are keen to see them remain a buffer between US military installations and their homeland. Imagine some bizarro parallel universe where Russia and China are actively suggesting plans to invade Mexico and already well established in Guatemala. If we enter into another cold war era, electronic warfare including threats on communication systems (including satellites) would likely be the new invisible 'front' as all developed nations have become heavily dependent on these systems which remain extremely vulnerable.

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#59

Post by teh_klev »

cm2187 wrote: post #37

I believe that until recently neither Azure or AWS had a datacenter in the UK. Cutting undersea cables between the UK and the US / Europe / Ireland could have some serious consequences in the UK, at the very least on the economy, possibly on its infrastructure (payment systems, communications, etc). But aren't terrestrial cables more vulnerables than undersea cables? Cutting undersea cables require sophisticated tech…

> Cutting terrestrial cables just requires a local guy with a map and some TNT.

The truth is much simpler, and less explosive, it's usually a JCB digger operated by the local water/gas/leccy company that causes mayhem.

Re: Russian submarine activity increases around Atlantic internet cables: report

#60

Post by virtuallynathan »

Pyxl101 wrote: post #15

Does anyone know if the data flowing across cables like these is typically encrypted? Does the infrastructure itself provide any defense against a submarine hacking into a cable and installing a device that can monitor traffic? I would hope that the infrastructure could add its own encryption across the link to defend against unauthorized interception.

It is possible to do this, you can get DWDM transmission equipment with encryption built in, I assume some submarine cable capacity purchasers make use of this, but is raises the cost by a decent amount.
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