Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted • Hacker News Board

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#51

Post by hengheng » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:43 PM UTC

I keep wondering if that scale of operation that we are witnessing is their "testing the waters" phase and it is 1% of their true capability, of if what we're seeing is already their full-steam operational pace.

They do a good job of instilling fear, but we've learned from Ukraine that there are a lot of paper Tigers in that army that aren't as capable in a real fight as they are in a demonstration.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#52

Post by heraldgeezer » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:45 PM UTC

whythre wrote: post #19

toss1 wrote: post #5

Substantial Russian activity also near UK, raises concerns that Russia would cut off UK. [0] Russian ships ‘plotting sabotage in the North Sea’ [1] [0] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/uk-undersea-... [1] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-ships...

Do these nations not have navies? Can’t they tell the Russian non-combat ships (or pressure them) to get lost?

We do but ocean and air is big :)

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/nato-jets-in...

Also with cables, they can be destroyed with "innocent" ships that have a right to be there actually :)

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65309687

Russia has a programme to sabotage wind farms and communication cables in the North Sea, according to new allegations.

The details come from a joint investigation by public broadcasters in Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland.

It says Russia has a fleet of vessels disguised as fishing trawlers and research vessels in the North Sea.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#53

Post by heraldgeezer » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:45 PM UTC

bell-cot wrote: post #2

It'd be nice to see stories about a western navy or two getting off its butt, and actually trying to discourage "accidents" which damage critical infrastructure.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65309687

Russia has a programme to sabotage wind farms and communication cables in the North Sea, according to new allegations.

The details come from a joint investigation by public broadcasters in Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland.

It says Russia has a fleet of vessels disguised as fishing trawlers and research vessels in the North Sea.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#54

Post by deliciousturkey » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:48 PM UTC

mg wrote: post #50

Hetzner seems unaffected? ping hel1-speed.hetzner.com Gives me 52ms from Germany which should be about normal?

It should be around 25 ms in normal conditions. That's what I got when pinging Hetzner in Germany, from Finland, when the cable was still in use and when using a connection that routes through the cable.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#55

Post by nyeah » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:49 PM UTC

schroeding wrote: post #48

gnabgib wrote: post #45

Discussion (44 points, 5 hours ago, 43 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42172565

It's a different cable, even though they were close together.

It seems very likely to be the same incident.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#56

Post by Etheryte » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:49 PM UTC

So to keep score, in the last year we've seen cables sabotaged between Finland and Germany, Lithuania and Sweden, Estonia and Sweden, Estonia and Finland. Any others I missed? You might say it's too early to call it sabotage, but the earliest two cable incidents were exactly the same, so it's hardly a coincidence at this point.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#57

Post by Stagnant » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:49 PM UTC

mg wrote: post #50

Hetzner seems unaffected? ping hel1-speed.hetzner.com Gives me 52ms from Germany which should be about normal?

I think it is slightly higher than normal. I remember getting 30-40ms pings to germany in recent years. 45-55ms is around the range it used to be in early 2010's before the direct cable from finland to germany was built.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#58

Post by wood_spirit » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 7:57 PM UTC

philip1209 wrote: post #23

It seems that the obvious solution could be Starlink-style meshes. Can anybody comment on how fragile the Starlink protocol would be during a war? If its line-of-sight, presumably it would be hard to jam?

Elon Musk is not someone Europe feels it can rely on in a crisis when Russia attacks

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#59

Post by mopsi » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 8:02 PM UTC

Swedish telco Telia reports that the undersea internet cable between Sweden and Lithuania was also damaged on Sunday: https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-english/19/2416006/undersea-ca...

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#60

Post by tetrisgm » Mon, Nov 18, 2024, 8:06 PM UTC

The constant Russian interference, combined with the regular escalation from the jets patrolling, and the radar jamming, really needs to be dealt with.

We're stuck between having to do timid actions and full NATO escalation. This feels like constant creep.