Middle East cables severed Again

[green granite]

The net is going to be very slow to that part of the world for quite a while.

Internet and phone communications between Europe, the Middle East, and Asia have been seriously disrupted after submarine cables were severed.

It is thought the FLAG FEA, SMW4, and SMW3 lines, near the Alexandria cable station in Egypt, have all been cut. Experts warned that it may be days before the fault is fixed and said the knock on effect could have serious repercussions on regional economies.

Full story: BBC NEWS | Technology | Severed cable disrupts web access

[Loose rivets]

I had no idea that 'we' were so reliant on cables. Satellite back-up yes, but not high proportion of data traffic.

Doubt it will make much difference to the quality of a lot of support calls however.

[bnt]

Unless it's absolutely necessary, your Internet traffic is getting to you without satellites. When the traffic is coming over a link via a geosynchronous satellite, the difference is very noticeable. It's capable of high throughputs, but the long distances involved mean high latency on every transfer. Since every TCP/IP block transfer is subject to a "handshake", the whole process of opening a single web page slows right down over satellite.

Video transfers etc. over satellite use different protocols that allow for more "in flight" data, not TCP/IP.