This week, Meta, the company behind Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, announced the Waterworth project, an ambitious plan to build an internet submarine cable of about 50,000 km surrounding the planet. It is longer from end to end than the circumference of the earth. When finished, it is expected that The huge cable connects to the United States, Brazil, South Africa, India and other regions along the route.
The project represents the latest effort of large technology companies to control most of the submarine cable infrastructure. That general change in whom it maintains the “pipes” of the Internet could change even more with The greatest data demands introduced by the competition for the advanced AI.
Although goal did not provide details about the journey, The graph shows a route that begins on the east coast of the United States, descends to South America and travels through the southern Atlantic Ocean Towards India. The final stretch of the cable crosses the entire Pacific Ocean to a port on the west coast of the United States.
It is still not clear exactly how much the Waterworth project will cost (Meta simply said he expects a “multimillionaire” investment). However, rumors indicated that Goal was prepared to spend 10 billion euros on a underwater cable project that would cover the world and that seems to coincide with the description of Waterworth. The project would end on a date close to 2030.
This is not the first finishing incursion into underwater connectivity. Mark Zuckerberg’s company has participated in at least 20 different cable projects during the last decade. However, these new cables are being built specifically taking into account artificial intelligence. The Waterworth project will use a system of 24 pairs of fibers That, according to goal, it will be particularly useful for AI projects with greater use of data. By way of comparison, many smaller submarine cables will only have between 8 and 16 pairs of fibers.
“While AI continues to transform industries and societies worldwide, it is clear that capacity, Resilience and global reach are more important than ever to support the leading infrastructure”, Said executives of the target network, Nagarajan and Aimé, in a statement.
Goal is also making an effort to protect your investment from the elements. The company says it will tend cables up to 7,000 meters deep and use “improved burial techniques” for Avoid damage caused by ship anchors and other dangers. Gives themñThe cables are unwanted are a priority. In January, the NATO Lanzeither An initiative to increase the surveillance of ships that cross sea BtoList afterands of a couple of suspicious cases in which the anchors givesñThe cables aron and caused power cuts. But the cables are also cut by less mundane guilty, such as natural disasters and sharks.
When it is completed, Meta says that the Waterworth project could Increase global cooperation between connected countries and accelerate economic developmentparticularly in low -income regions located along their routes.
But cable expansion projects such as these also lead to some concerns. Some marine scientists say that it is still clear what long -term effects can have the electromagnetic fields generated by cables in the health of marine life. There are also possible political complications to consider. In 2020, goal (then called Facebook) and Google were forced to abandon plans to build an underwater cable that connected to the United States with Hong Kong after US security agencies warned that it could possibly become an objective of the Chinese government’s essence.