Topic: The severing of international Internet cables. (Read 312 times)

Now that we have entered the Wireless era, if you want to avoid unilateral cable cuts due to America's aggressive actions, then use wireless internet services. Maybe you can use Elon Musk's Starlink. But I don't know how it applies to Mining Machines, whether it is strong or not. Cables are always a problem everywhere, not just in America, this is also due to natural conditions that cause internet cables to break.

This wasn’t caused by the government so it isn’t about your country. From the information I got, it affected various countries. Also, even if communication can be hindered, it can’t be hindered all over the world. Asides the fact that there’s starlink which brings even more connectedness, all the internet can’t be shut down at the same time. Maybe unless there’s an alien invasion and they have some sort of radioactive wave that blinds all signal (if you believe in aliens).

Everyone is talking about the advantage of using this network when shared between interested users but have also forgotten what could be the implication of it when the agreed terms are breached by one of the parties or when one of them engages in an act that could put you all in trouble through the shared network. This could be a solution to get out of this network issue for the meantime, but having it shared won’t make it last forever because along the way, misunderstandings and lack of trusts are bound to change some rules which won’t go well down the line.

To have access to bitcoin network always needs good internet connectivity, but if it is not mandatory to own a star link because of its high cost now, it is better not to split the bills and purchase one for now because of the implications it could pose to you. The network downtime will be fixed soon and things will go back to normal until then, we will also wait for other international internet networks to be cheaper and accessible to one individual per network.

As far as I understand bitcoin network does not work with any purpose of decentralization. As a digital currency the network will have no effect. No one can destroy the vision of Bitcoin. The Bitcoin network is a peer-to-peer network operated through a cryptographic protocol. An ad-hoc decentralized network of volunteers is sufficient for this. The leadership of the bitcoin network will remain the same even if the country's internet outages cause problems for the war.

I believe there is eventually a danger underlying it and it is an event that has happened before, in 2013 there was a similar attempt, but due to their configuration these cables have redundancy, that allows the network to survive in percentages that do not lead to a collapse.

I had thought that the recent internet collapse is peculiar to my country alone. I have watched out to see others complain and I have just seen now. I had thought communication will always be unhindered, but the recent collapse made me think twice. Like internet could be stopped or what ...

It depends if there's alot of understanding and co-operation in your neighborhood. You can only do this with people of great understanding.

Wow! Some interesting replies and opinions in this thread.

I was surprised to see an accusation that I am Chinese of Russian. I think that many here know that I am a traditional Englishman, and I am ex-public school ( those are the posh expensive ones in England, not the free state ones). I have traditional English values , and I am saddened by the direction the UK has taken over the last years. I am an ex-systems programmer, and I have been trained to question most problems and issues, and to try to establish the root causes. For example, if you consider the reasons that the US started the war in Ukrain, and why Boris Johnson ( an Eton/Oxford banker ) destroyed the peace agrrement agreed with Russia, you can get some idea of the possible direction that international warfare will take over the next 10 years. A nuclear war is unlikely. Why do you need to risk damaging national assets, when you can selectively destroy a population by replacing its farming with synthetic products that reduce fertility and longevity. Then you can further weaken the populatiion with poisonous pharmaceuticals and fake pandemics.

I believe the threat to the Internet lies in the international connectivity, and not in its servers. Of course government restriction may affect servers in some countries, but this should leave other countries free to communicate. Most of the international traffic is carried via submarine cabling, and I understand that around 85% of the European/American traffic passes by the Faroe islands. Russia and other countries must be aware of this, and there are reports of unusual vessels sniffing around this area. The loss of these cables would make it difficult for the US to prosecute a war against China. The Houthi attacks on cables in the Red Sea are fairly widely reported, and Telecoms companies are having to reroute cables as a result. This is expersive, and very disruptive. Satellite links are also vulnerable and expensive.

My suggestion was an attempt to reduce the international traffic required by the Bitcoin blockchain and mining, and hopefully this would make it more secure without reducing its fundamental decentralisation. Unfortunately my knowledge of Bitcoin is not sufficient to flesh out my suggestions, and I hoped that some of the more knowledgeable members here could provide this, or dismiss the suggestion as impractical.

The only problem is that there are currently no solutions tailored for such solutions and it might get nasty for "decentralized networks". If ever there is a time to gain 100% or (51% for most blockchain networks) control of a blockchain network, that might be the time we see these networks face real threats. Now is the best time for possible solutions to start creating those. While it would be interesting to know how it plays out, I think that most blockchains aren't for such technological disaster. This is a problem. Anybody that solves this global-sized problem should make bank and its definitely not Starlink as I have seen others suggested in this thread already.

You’ve seen the amount of money invested in cryptocurrency? Have you checked how much is in the Bitcoin market? People have invested really large sums of money into crypto and for those who know what they have in it, they won’t want to miss a beat. But like I heard, this affected Africa continent. They can be smart about it by contributing money to purchase it (if they can’t afford it individually). Same goes for the subscription.

In light of the tense global situation and hints about the possibility of a nuclear war due to the Russian-Ukrainian war and the indirect confrontation between Russia and NATO, there is a possibility, albeit weak, of such a nuclear war.

If this war occurs, God forbid, the electricity and Internet infrastructure around the world will be affected and may be completely destroyed. There are central Internet servers spread around the world, and if they are destroyed, it may lead to an Internet outage in most countries of the world, and thus a real problem will arise for the Bitcoin network if there is no Spare solutions.

Well if international internet or internet itself will be totally be gone then that's when we can say that bitcoin will be greatly affected expect that its price might drop or not we never know but the thing is bitcoin mining will be the first to be affecred or bitcoin transactions, because if internet will be gone or let say has defect in many countries then we know thta bitcoin is being run by nodes or machine that would process the transactions or builing block in bitcoin if those nodes or machines will be affected then expect bitcoin will become more slower or worst there will be no processes transaction anymore, but yeah its far from happening because even international internet cables are being affected we all know they have a back up or alterbative way in order for internet to still work. One thing is for sure: the internet will never be gone unless under certain circumstances.

Those are some serious accusations you are making.
Without any credible sources or links to back them up they are not credible and it seems you are only here to spread FUD.

This thread ought to be deleted for spreading misinformation. Wouldn't be surprised if the OP is Chinese or Russian.

Bitcoin relies on a global internet network to function as intended.  Without interconnectivity between countries, Bitcoin would fragment into separate, national systems with their own ledgers and values.  This would undermine the vision of Bitcoin as a singular, decentralized borderless digital currency.

Lightening network is not Internet connection, it makes Bitcoin transaction time faster, but it doesn't have any relation with Internet connection.

From someone from a third world country, seeing this thread amused me. It has become such a norm in my country that the internet connection is slow. When we visit other countries, we always get surprised how fast the internet connections are. Of course we are still lucky to be able to connect to an internet connection but it’s definitely not as fast as it would have been in other countries. To me, it doesn’t really come in between transactions. I don’t think the internet connection is what is affecting the transaction process although of course it’s a factor, it’s more about the congested mempool that is primarily the cause,

Sharing does not always work, it is sometimes better to not do something at all if you cannot afford the cost personally than to decide to share it with others.

What happens when one neighbor decides to move to another neighborhood? or when one or two persons start defaulting in remitting the monthly fee agreed?

Consider your security too, will you want to be on the same shared network with a neighbor who you are not sure of their internet activity and what they do online? there are just many challenges and problems that comes with sharing.

The problem you underline is far more complex than it may seem.

Bitcoin is not ready for such a rough event yet.  Pray to God this does not happen before a solution is found.

Biggest problem of this situation is how do you do this without having to rely on central powers.  Be it big Mining companies, satellites or what ever else.  We would rely on them entirely.  This also means there could be Censorship and all.

There is an even bigger underlying problem though.  The world itself is not ready for such a scenario.  If the Internet drops, pretty much every thing freezes.  How many people could calculate with out the Internet.  How many people could find answers with no Internet connection.  How will deliveries work.  There would be no more E-mail et cetera.

The closest thing we have is being able to broadcast Bitcoin Transactions through SMS or Radio.  But even these are in some sort of 'beta' stage and very rarely ever used.  Now here comes my challenge.  Internet shuts down.  WHO do you exchange Bitcoin with?  How will you ensure the Bitcoin you received is legitimate, considering there is no Full Node to verify it with?  Do you just rely on a broadcast with no Internet connection as if you simply added a Bitcoin Transaction to an Airgapped Electrum Wallet?

It would be tough as crap to use Bitcoin in your scenario!  So as I said.  Pray this never happens before we get a real solution to it!

If you ask about investors then most of the investors who earn more than $1000 per month can afford it if they keep their expenses minimum. The cost of per month subscription is around $120 at the moment but someone can further reduce the cost by sharing it with others.

Let's say if 4 neighbors need internet in a country where internet is poor then all four of them can contribute $30 per month to enjoy fast satellite internet. What if instead of 4 neighbors 8 neighbors contribute for that? The cost will be $15 per person for a fast internet connection.

I'm very sure that for a fast connection many of us would spend $15 per month without thinking twice. However, the initial cost of $600 could be an issue which can also be reduced for each person if 8 of them contribute $75 for the first month of having that type of internet facility.

I can understand the OP concern about the internet being compromised, it can disrupt a lot of things that depends on the internet connection to function effectively, especially for Bitcoin that is completely digital, so it's a good idea if we're thinking of alternative ways to carry out transactions if anything were to affect the internet connection. I live in Nigeria, and for a couple of weeks I've been finding it difficult to connect to the internet, even to access this forum will take a long time, initially I thought that it was perhaps the network in my area, before I started hearing of others that are complaining too. Development of more alternative means of manoeuvering the internet for Bitcoin transactions will be very welcomed.

what jetcash is eluding to.. is:
where whales(custodians) lock up say 1m btc each (per country/continent). which only moves infrequently between the whales(countries) onchain when they have good inter-communication onchain

where by they then split their reserves to people under them in some subnetwork per country.

but under this system he views it where normal people no longer rely on the bitcoin network for payments/UTXO ownership. but instead rely on custodians that have the UTXO and users have 'child tx' which unsettled and also has a parent(custodian) funding it which is also unsettled inbound balance(IOU) to the child tx on a countries domestic subnetwork so they can swap their unsettled IOU balances between other people on their domestic subnetwork via changing the unsettled(unconfirmed) balance of candidate parent-child transactions

It's a really good question, last I checked, starlink was quite expensive, I can't remember the exact amount it was then, but what I did remember was that, I had the intention of buying one, but after I saw the price, i withing myself acknowledged that it's not affordable to me at that moment and even now, and this is even outside the monthly subscription.

And back to the op discussion, it is really annoying, all through the week, the entire cities in Nigeria, as well as ghana and some other African countries had suffered a very severe poor internet connection, to the extent that even accessing this forum was a very huge challenge for some of us.
I am not quite knowledgeable when it comes to how things like this works, but with all sincerely, having an alternative would be really a good idea, for what if one day, governments around the world wake up and decide to pull the plug on internet, just to stop bitcoin - very low chances of happening though, but just imagining.

This can truly affect the use of bitcoin by the people since it involves the use of the internet in most cases to perform a bitcoin transaction and the network failure seems to be going beyond the limit, but we must not also learn to attribute everything happening the negative way to US being the cause, what i heard some saying was the international cable while some say it has to do with the fallen of one of the 4G satellite or cable as the case may be


This may not actually be a serious problem since what was been encountered is just a minor case whereby the network becomes more difficult to access and not that its completely gone and inaccessible, i think it may only take a few more days to get all fixed, anything centralized could not be a solution to this on a long term, but we want to believe the governments are working on something we will all b e exposed to later.

This illustrates the point. Surely it would be possible to have a local mempool to accept transactions. If a country has one or more large mining complexes, then they could select transactions from that pool, and connect to the blockchain via expensive alternative networds. This could result in confirnmation times of around a day or so, depending on the success of the local miners. However, this would be better than no access to the blockchain for the majority of Bitcoin users.

We must face the fact that we are in a period of banking, political and economic turmoil. There is also increasing military activity to change the status of many countries. For example, who would have thought that Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso would have become major influences in Africa, The US has strengthened Putin, and as a consequence, it has made the Russian military into possibly the world's strongest army. Their economy is booming, and they are gaining an enhance reputation in the world. The US has lost its war in Ukrain, and its support of the actions of the Zionists is turning many populatiions against them. They are neglecting US infrastructure and the population in an attempt to posture against China, Russian, Iran and other countries. The attack on the Yemen may have initiated the cutting of Internet cables. It has certainly caused massive disruptions in shipping, and this will affect the US significantly. As individuals, we need to plan ahead to enable us to weather the economic and political storms.

How many investors in bitcoins can really afford the Starlink? and its monthly subscription?

Without a good internet connection Bitcoin users will face some issues. Internet cables are most important for everyone who is using internet and if those undersea cables start getting affected then the whole communication system will be non-responsive. Those cables are planted undersea and because of them we are able to use internet effectively, even wireless internet is dependent on such cables. I'm talking about traditional wireless internet setups like 3G, 4G, and 5G.

I believe we already have good alternative which is Starlink. It could be a good alternative for us when the cable issues make internet communications slow or not responsive. Starlink works via Satellite and it's not dependent on those undersea internet cables. It also works well in remote areas, the only problem with Starlink is the high cost of the connectivity. Starlink's connections are fast with low latency and that can be useful for transactions when traditional networks get slow or they stop working fully. I believe the Starlink could be another good alternative when traditional networks stop responding due to cable severing.

What belligerent actions of the u.s. are you talking about? Intercontinental communications is so important to everyone individually and also to countries and businesses as well, i don't see the benefit of a deliberate act to weaken it by any party.
I don't think internet connection is a major problem for BTC users, i know BTC cannot function without the internet, but other than some areas in some third world countries that lack electricity and internet connection, most bitcoiners can connect to the network just fine. If the issue of faster payments is raised, then i believe what we should be discussing is scalability solutions.

Lightening network is not an alternative to internet connection needed for communication between servers.

Wireless radio signals like LoRa could be a alternative solution down the road, as I'm sure similar networks would be launched with time.

I'm starting to see more and more reports of Internet cables being severed. We have always had a few fail as a result of accidental damage, but the bellicose actions of the US seem to be leading us into a period of deliberate damage to weaken intercontinental communications. This could damage Bitcoin usage. It occured to me that one possibility would be to have a number of national networks similar to the Lighting network. This would provided faster payments, and allow slower transfers to and from the Bitcoin blockchain to become less significant. It also gives rise to the possibility that LoRa communications could be used as an alternative to the Internet as it gains in popularity.