We've been watching much of the Middle East lose chunks of their telecommunications traffic over the past week--without knowing what to make of it. I wanted to point to this post from John Robb, an expert on asymmetric warfare, with some meta thoughts on the possibilities of such disruptions.

  • Vulnerability. All of the same network vulnerabilities we see other infrastructures are in force with the Internet's long haul systems (the network analysis of systempunkts applies). If this was a real attack rather than a series of accidents (the geographical concentration is interesting in this regard), then this was likely a capabilities test that yielded data on response times, impact, and duration.
  • Means. Attacks on undersea cables are within the capacity of small groups to accomplish. With precise mapping (these cables take very circuitous routes), a cable could be cut with as little as an anchor. However, nation-states are the most capable in this sphere (including, a growing number of micropowers). Why would a nation-state do this? Deterrence. Disconnection from the global communications grid is very likely become a form of economic/social coercion in the future (for standard national security reasons all the way down to an inability/unwillingness to crack down on rampant Internet crime, which is growing into a HUGE global problem).
  • Precision. It's very hard to precisely target an attack's damage. Regional impacts are unavoidable (collective punishment for everyone that connects to the target country?). Here's a final point to consider: closed systems like China's that route traffic through firewall choke-points, or other closely held infrastructure, are likely very vulnerable to an attack of this type. [my emphasis]

I've highlighted two points: this kind of attack could be feasibly launched by a small group. And the intent of such an attack might be political coercion. 

If you tie the notion of coercion to the two countries that lost the most service--Egypt and Pakistan--it has interesting implications.