2w ago

Canada Has 4 International Fibre Optic Cables That Physically Bypasses the US

NewFoundland:

Greenland Connect: from Newfoundland to Greenland. Tusass A/S (Danish-owned) 2009.
St. Pierre and Miquelon Cable: from Newfoundland to St. Pierre and Miquelon France. French Authority of St. Pierre and Miquelon (French-owned) 2018.

Nova Scotia:

EXA Express: from Nova Scotia to UK. EXA Infrastructure (British-owned) 2015.

BC:

Topaz: from BC to Japan. Google (American-owned) 2023.

I propose that the next projects should go straight to the Philippines, Taiwan, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, France, Norway and Spain. We should not involve anymore american companies in our crucial infrastructure projects.

Source:

8 comments

Are these cables simply laid down on the ocean floor? 🤔
- Yes. Amazing that they have been laying cables across oceans since the 1800s.
  
  1858 to be specific: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transatlantic_telegraph_cable
  
  Wow! I could only imagine the tangled mess that is!? I see raised floor data centers frequently and if it’s anything like that then we’re in trouble 😬
- Yeah, pretty much standard everywhere, and lately Chinese ships have been spotted purposely dragging their anchors back and forth trying to damage them in various areas.
The vast majority of internet traffic originating from Canada doesn't actually go through these lines. Do a MTR/traceroute to anywhere and unless you're on specific commercial networks, all of your traffic will be going through a US Internet Exchange at some point because it's way cheaper for your local greedy telecom.
Here are their ASNs:
Greenland Connect: Tusass A/S (AS8818)
St. Pierre and Miquelon Cable: SPM Telecom (AS3695)
EXA Express: EXA Infrastructure (AS30740)
Topaz: Google (AS15169)
Two are terminal links to connect isolated regions, the other two are commercial links not used by home internet users.
Can we get in country connection not going into the states.
- We have those. Coast to coast. Runs parallel to the CNR mainline.
  (There is also another set of fibers that run parallel to the CPR mainline, but it dips into the US for a bit to get from Manitoba to Ontario south of the Great lakes)
  Source: I used to maintain them before I retired.

8 comments