作者/Author(s): Sean Monaghan, Michael Darrah, Eskil Jakobsen, and Otto Svendsen 

網站來源/Source: Center for Strategic and International Studies 

日期/Date: 03/07/2024 

關鍵字/Keywords: 互賴、資訊、灰色地帶戰術

摘要：

歐洲與亞洲之間大部分的海底電纜恰好都會經過紅海，其流量約占全球網路總流量 17%。近期胡塞武裝組織擊沉了一艘外國船隻，意外波及附近海底纜線，造成網路中斷。在網路時代，海底基礎設施至關重要，但也非常脆弱。 

  • 除了北溪天然氣管道遭到破壞，北極附近的網路電纜也遭到有意或無意的破壞。北約對這些事件憂心忡忡，甚至成立了一個新的中心，確保海底基礎設施安全。 
  • 海底電纜對全球資訊經濟至關重要，但也極易被蓄意攻擊或受到意外事故影響。運營商為了幫助導航和防止事故而明確標記海底電纜位置，反倒讓破壞者有機可趁利用灰色地帶戰術破壞電纜。 
  • 隨著全球各地衝突蔓延，網路電纜遭破壞情形越來越常見。有的國家可能會攻擊海底基礎設施，但國際社會很難指控任何國家行為者，甚至無法確定其是否有意。 
  • 雖然灰色地帶的攻擊很難完全避免，但各國政府可以增強應變能力，提高海域意識，以保護海底基礎設施。 
  1. 新的海底設備應該具備堅固、故障安全、可靠和快速恢復的特性。 
  2. 在增強基礎設施的韌性同時，也必須改進監測技術，盡早檢測到敵意才能有效避免電纜事故。 
  • 由於網路電纜纜對企業至關重要，各國政府可以考慮與私營部門合作，共同保護海底基礎設施。

 

Summary: 

The Red Sea hosts most of the undersea telecommunication cables connecting Europe and Asia and around 17% of total global internet traffic. Recently, Houthis sunk a foreign-owned ship that also accidentally damaged the undersea cables, disrupting the internet. Undersea infrastructure is crucial yet highly vulnerable in the age of an interconnected world. 
  • Apart from the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, internet cables near the Arctic were damaged intentionally or inadvertently. NATO was worried about the incidents, so it established a new center to secure undersea infrastructure. 
  • Undersea cables are critical to the global information economy but are highly vulnerable to deliberate attacks or accidents. Saboteurs can use grey-zone tactics to damage the cables, especially when operators mark the locations clearly to aid navigation and prevent accidents. 
  • Damages to internet cable become increasingly common as conflicts proliferate globally. Although some countries can attack undersea infrastructure, it is hard to implicate any state actors and identify whether it is intentional.  
  • It is hard to deter grey zone aggressions, but governments can increase resilience and improve maritime domain awareness to protect undersea infrastructures. 
  1. New undersea projects should have hardened, fail-safe, sufficient redundancy, and quickly recoverable properties. 
  2. Making infrastructure resilient must be coupled with improved monitoring to deter attacks by detecting hostilities early. 
  • Since internet cables are crucial to businesses, governments could partner with the private sector to protect the infrastructure. 
回上層