Submarine cables transport 95% of data traffic between continents. They hold ten billion dollars daily in financial transactions, according to figures collected by Telegeography, and feed from streaming to artificial intelligence networks. And yet, its control no longer belongs to the great traditional teleoperators: it has largely passed to technological giants such as Google, Meta, Microsoft y Amazon. A deep transformation that raises questions about dependence, digital sovereignty and resilience to geopolitical risks.
For more than a century, the submarine cables were a matter of consortiums of public operators and large telecos. Installing them cost hundreds of millions of dollars, and it was common to distribute the risk among several actors in exchange for assigning fiber pairs to each participant. Recent examples, such as the 2Africa cable, promoted by Meta, follow this model. However, in just a decade, this balance has jumped through the air.
Today, Google, Meta, Microsoft and Amazon control or manage approximately half of the world underwater bandwidth. Between 2019 y 2023They financed about 25% of activated cable systems, according to Carnegie Endowment. At the global level, the construction of about 60 new submarine cables until 2027 is expected, as indicated by the latest Telegeography map, which gives an idea of the magnitude of the cycle change in the control of critical infrastructure of the Internet.
How technology took over the underwater routes
The qualitative leap is not only in participation: also in full property. Google has in full cables such as Curie (USA-Chile), Dunant (USA-France), Grace Hopper (USA-Spanish-Spanish Reino) and Equiano (Portugal-Nigeria-Sudaphrica). Meta, on the other hand, has planned Waterworth: a cable of just over 40,000 km that will connect USA directly with important markets of the southern hemisphere, including points in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific, deliberately avoiding risk areas such as the Red Sea and the South China Sea.
The case of 2Africa, although still based on consortium, also reflects the evolution: here, goal participates significantly as a key partner of the consortium with several operators.
Europe is the continent with more mooring cables on the planet, according to the Carnegie Endowment. Two thirds of their external connectivity depend on submarine cables, which underlines its high strategic exposure. In addition, much of the European traffic is stored in data centers located in the US, as analyzed by the ITIIF, increasing its technological dependence.
Faced with this panorama, Europe has some strategic assets, such as Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN), world leader in kilometers of cable installed between 2020 and 2024, and Orange Marine, which operates one of the largest installation and repair fleets. Paris and Rome have already launched movements to protect Asn and Sparkle as “sovereign industrial champions.”
The threat to cables It is no longer just accidental. Russia has intensified its underwater patrols around strategic nodes, and in 2025 China presented a ship capable of cutting cables at 4,000 meters deep, according to the South China Morning Post, increasing its asymmetric pressure capacity on critical routes.
In addition, the lack of response capacity complicates the scenario: there are hardly 80 ships worldwide dedicated to laying and repair of cables, according to the Carnegie Endowment, and Europe lacks specialized breakwinds, necessary to operate in Arctic regions or in marine ice conditions, where new strategic connectivity routes are being explored.
The underwater critical infrastructure also faces a fragmented legal framework. Several European countries have not even ratified the 1884 convention cable, which hinders the Persecution of sabotage acts. Meanwhile, installation and repair permits in Europe have doubled in duration in the last decade, complicating the response to incidents.
To correct it, the EU and the NATO have created joint initiatives, such as the Critical Unclea Infrastructure Coordination Cell and a Task Force Industrial. However, some analysts insist that without a drastic increase in resources, Europe will continue to be disadvantaged.
Towards a more fragmented and dependent Internet
The massive entry of great technological responds to a clear logic: control the physical layer of the Internet allows them to reduce costsimprove efficiency and guarantee alternative routes to crises. For traditional telecos, the dilemma is clear: collaborate or be displaced.
Some operators continue to play a relevant role, although adapting to an ecosystem with a strong presence of the great technological giants.
In the near future, intercontinental traffic is expected to double every two years, driven by 5G, cloud distributed and artificial intelligence. Alternative routes are being explored, such as polar corridors, which would significantly reduce Europe-Asia latency.
In parallel, fears of a physical “splinternet” grow: cable networks segmented by political alliances, with Europe discussing between its historical opening and the need to protect their strategic interests, as Oxford analysts point out.
Although we usually imagine the cloud as an intangible space, the reality is that much rest on a complex physical infrastructure. And that infrastructure, more and more, is controlled by US multinationals. For Europe, the challenge is not just building more cables: it is to ensure that the next generation of the Internet does not depend mostly on foreign actors.
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