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Undersea Fiber Optic Cables Go Missing

Undersea Fiber Optic Cables Go Missing: “We’ve talked about the high price of copper is leading to crime around the world as people are looking to steal anything copper and sell it. Due to this, the Vietnamese government thought it would make sense to allow local fisherman to grab old Vietnam War-era undersea cable lines and resell it for profit. What they didn’t count on was that (would you believe it?) these local Vietnamese fishermen don’t know the difference between old unused war-era undersea copper… and new, important internet- and television- connecting fiber-optic lines. Yes, it seems those fisherman are digging up whatever cables they can find and shockingly, aren’t bothering to make sure that it’s the copper lines they’re taking, rather than the vastly more important fiber ones. 27 miles of fiber optics have gone missing, and it’s going to cost many millions to replace. While the allowance to fish up copper lines has now been rescinded, did anyone actually believe that local fishermen would either know the difference or care enough to make sure they were only digging up the proper cable lines?”

(Via Tech Dirt.)