Russian Cable Cutters: Could the Kremlin Cut Global Internet Cables?

^{This article was last updated on February 4}

As the world watches the military build-up of the Kremlin along the Ukrainian border, the irish army is concerned Russian naval activity in its own backyard. This is where Russian drills are to take place perilously close to strategic undersea communications cables that represent an overlooked element of a potential Russian escalation: an effort to blind the world to events unfolding in Ukraine.

Armed with a sophisticated set of cyber capabilities, the Russian government has long relied, even against a cyber power like China, on destructive attacks that degrade or destroy systems, such as the one that cut the electricity networks in Ukraine in 2015. Not to mention the vast network of actors, from state agencies to front companies to recruited cybercriminals, who carry out a series of cyber and information operations against enemies of the Putin regime. But Russia’s weaponization of technology isn’t just about code and keyboards: While attackers can damage, destroy, or simply power down physical internet infrastructure, like undersea cables, they can disrupt Internet communications in a target area to cause public panic and unrest. , undermine economic activity and disrupt the flow of communications between government and citizens.

It is now a distinct possibility if Russia intensifies further in Ukraine.

Recent history suggests so. When Russia illegally invaded and annexed Crimea in 2014, one of its alleged first actions was to damage some vscommunication cables* belonging to the Ukrtelecom monopoly which linked the peninsula to Ukraine. This partially interrupted internet connectivity* provided the Kremlin with another leverage point over the region and limited global visibility on the early stages of the conflict from the “grey zone” (a term used to refer to a conflict that falls below the threshold of the war). This shows that the Kremlin recognizes the importance of the physical dimensions of online control and coercion. At the national level, for example, the state has moved to exercise greater control over physical Internet infrastructure by forcing companies to install more monitoring and filtering technologies. And when digital control mechanisms fail or are insufficient, the state turns to physical coercion citizens and foreign technology employees.

The last two decades of Russian military doctrine have also witnessed a growing accent on the importance of software, hardware and cognitive control in modern conflict. This perspective is not lost on Western officials. More recently, the head of the United Kingdom’s armed forces warned that Russian naval activity could threaten submarine cables and allow Moscow to disrupt global internet traffic.

Slasher Scenarios

In the current crisis, observers should monitor the an underwater cable that carries global internet traffic directly to Ukraine: the Kerch Strait Cable, laid in 2014 by Rostelecom, the Russian public telecommunications company. After the annexation, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Crimea began using cable to route Internet traffic across Russia. Since the most immediate impact of its shutdown would be on Internet communications in Crimea itself, the Kremlin might be less likely to damage this cable.

Still, if the standoff over Ukraine escalates, the Kremlin might calculate that such a move is worth the risk if it can be combined with other actions to disrupt internet communications in the rest of the country as well. In this scenario, Russian military and intelligence assets in Crimea could have their internet access disrupted (perhaps giving Ukraine a reason to target this infrastructure). But at the same time, targeting the cable while targeting other infrastructure outside Crimea could cause panic in the rest of Ukraine and limit the international community’s visibility on other Russian actions, which corresponds much to the willingness of the Kremlin to accept certain costs to invade and forcibly exercise control over Ukraine.

Ukrainian Internet traffic is also routed via terrestrial cables, such as fiber optics, cross-border communication lines. The Russian military could physically damage, take hostage or cut power to the facilities of Internet Service Providers (which deliver Internet traffic to users) and Internet Exchange Points (which exchange traffic between ISPs). These physical components in Ukraine carry global internet traffic, so disrupting them would impact the international sphere and force some of the traffic to be routed around Ukraine, but the worst effects would be felt inside the country because these components primarily route traffic to Ukrainians.

In the most damaging scenario on a global scale, the Russian military could target one of dozens of undersea cables connecting other parts of Europe to the global internet and which, by extension, could carry traffic from (and to) Ukraine. For example, there are sixteen submarine cables moving Ireland, and cutting some of these cables – a few of which are near the Russian drill* – would adversely affect the flow of global internet traffic and could take several hours or even days to repair. It could also significantly distract these countries from other world events.

In addition to preparing to damage Russian cyber operations against Ukraine, as well as countries that Russian President Vladimir Putin considers himself pro-Ukrainian, Kiev and its allies must be prepared for the potential targeting of Internet cables. Moscow knows that information is vital in a crisis and that controlling or entirely disrupting its flow can offer significant strategic advantages.

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Justin Sherman (@jshermcyber) is a non-resident member of the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security’s Cyber ​​Statecraft Initiative.

An earlier version of this article incorrectly characterized how Russia is believed to have physically damaged internet infrastructure in 2014. Several land cables were reportedly damaged, not a single undersea cable. This article has also been updated to clarify that the 2014 blackout did not disrupt all internet connectivity in Crimea and that Russian naval activity was close to a few cables, all sixteen not touching Ireland.

Further reading

Mon 31 Jan 2022

What do we know about cyber operations during militarized crises?

Summary of the question
Through
Michael Fischerkeller

This essay focuses on how cyber operations used during militarized crises are likely to impact escalation management. Cyber ​​operations designed as crisis exits in the event of a crisis could have the opposite outcome to that intended. Given the lack of direct experience, policymakers need to critically examine assumptions and claims that cyber operations can serve as crisis defusers.

Image: Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky Project 636.3 Varshavyanka B-274 diesel-electric submarine, commissioned in November 2019, passes the Russky Bridge over the Eastern Bosphorus Strait. Photo via Yuri Smityuk/TASS.