A mechanic and an electrician maintaining an undersea cable off the coast of Hawaii in 2016. Credit: U.S. Navy, Creative Commons
Ninety-nine percent of international internet communications travel through undersea cables no thicker than a coffee cup before reaching their final destination. While private companies mostly own these fiber optic wires in the United States, whatever country they land in could, theoretically, have the opportunity to access their data.
And that’s what worries Team Telecom, a newly formalized interagency national security committee led by the Department of Justice that, in recent months, has focused its attention on America’s internet connections to China. At such a critical moment in U.S.-China relations, observers say the committee’s actions have to walk a fine line between safeguarding American data and national security and taking a potentially isolationist approach that cedes control over the world’s digital infrastructure.
When American telecom and internet companies want to lay new cables, they file their plans with the Federal Communications Commission. In th
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