How to cut off the Internet the easy way? A Shovel
Summary: Who needs to be a dictator when you can cut off the Internet with one shovel.
According to the Guardian, one little old lady in Georgia managed to cut off an entire country, Armenia, from the Internet for five hours Her weapon? A shovel.
No, I’m not kidding.
The story goes that the woman was hunting for copper, which is worth real money these days everywhere, when in mid-dig, her shovel cut the fibre-logic cable which carried 90% of Armenia’s Internet.
Whoops.
The so-called “spade-hacker” with one slice managed to cut off Armenia’s Internet for five hours on March 28th. Who needs a back-hoe to kill off the Internet, when a shovel will do?
It’s all better now, but I think this brief little story makes an important point. We may still think, even after what has happened in Bahrain, Egypt, and Libya, that the Internet is nuclear-war proof. It’s not.
Yes, that may have been the Internet’s design spec. but that’s not the reality. Sure, in Japan, as we just saw in the aftermath of disaster, or the U.S. 0r Western Europe, the Internet can stand up to a beating, but, in all too many places, the Internet is dangling from a single slender spider’s thread of connectivity.
See Also:
Surviving Disaster: Japan’s Internet
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Talkback
And that is surprising how?
When a country is under a civil war, or is in need of locating sources of fuel to stabilize their country, would they really invest in the internet/telecommunication infrastructure to the level of triple redundency?
What is surprising here is the fact that the cable was burried shallow enough that a shovel could easily strike it.
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
I guess everybody who got conned on the "cloud" ...
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
Maybe Armenians will dig deeper for gold than most.
Seriously, the depth involved in burying cable seems to have been reduced. About twelve years ago SW Bell (ATT) ran an underground cable to a new house up the street. They did this by laying the cable in a narrow trench about two feet deep. Last fall an ATT contractor put in a cable to a house across the street and this is only a couple of inches down. Neither cable was armored.
The two foot trench did make more of a mess of the lawn.
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
Well I was living in Jeff City, MO for a while and had cable connection. That company just laid the cable on the grass and every tuesday a lawn mower used cut the cable while mowing lawn and I had to call the cable company and after few times of this I had to cancel the service.
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
Yeah this sounds a bit suspicious.
Just because Armenia's network is poorly groomed...
So no, this story does not make an important point. Instead, it's just another case of the media trying to paint doom and gloom for no reason other than their own benefit.
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
I wouldn't really call this story an act of painting "doom and gloom", for this is something that is beyond unlikely to happen in most places. It is just a fun little story for geeks to read and talk about, so take it for what it is in my opinion.
who needs a shovel? Frost does the job too.
At least annually this U.S.A. area of 16K+ square miles is cut off; typically by a backhoe, but at least once after a brutal winter by frost heaves (for those living in warmer climates - look up the phenomena). AT&T doesn't feel redundancy is justified.
Mr. Vaughan-Nichol's story doesn't happen only in far off countries.
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
Public Internet Never Bomb Proof
As for burial depth - doesn't matter. Cables seem to be homing beacons for backhoes, flood washouts, train derailments, etc. I remember when the entire Southeast US was cut off from telephone service because a farmer in Alabama buried his favorite cow in the back 40. I also know that cable mining by Western Electric (back before they were Lucent) in NYC cut off lower Manhattan for an entire business day because a tech mis-marked a cable adn the next tech just cut it because it had a tag on it.
Stuff happens and nothing is idiot proof.
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
Most of North America's cables are above ground...
Much (most?) of Europe's cables are buried...
Redundancy is the "law" in much of Europe...
Taxes fund secure and redundant services of any kind...
America hates taxes... and Canada is not far behind...
You get what you pay for...
Unfortunately, in spite of all the talk, North America is far from secure...
As you sow, so you shall reap...
And the reaper is coming...
Taking down overhead cables does not require much of an imagination!!!...
By the way, has anyone noticed that Japan seems to be handling their earthquake and tsunami crisis much better than Bush handled Katrina?
RE: How to cut off the Internet the easy easy? A Shovel
Use a power post hole auger...
My brother managed this putting in a fence. Luckily, it was only a stub off the main cable, so it only cost a few hundred dollars to fix.
Remember, call before you dig is your friend!