Cables for Portugal
More than 95% of intercontinental data traffic does not go into space: it dives to the bottom of the sea. Find out why you will be hearing more and more about submarine cables.
We have long grown used to communicating without barriers. An hour is not enough to travel from Portugal to Brazil, but a data packet leaves Sines and reaches Fortaleza in less than a second. Many people believe we depend on satellites. That is no longer the case. More than 95% of intercontinental data traffic does not go into space. It dives to the bottom of the sea.
Hearing about them for the first time sounds like science fiction. Far from it. Submarine cables, which link continents and cross oceans, are today among the most critical infrastructures there are. Ten trillion dollars in financial transactions flow through them… every day. Do I have your attention now?
AI translation from the Portuguese. First published in ECO on 16 March 2023.