Plans to build an undersea data cable between Los Angeles and Hong Kong have been suspended after the US expressed fears that the Chinese government could use it to spy on them.
The US communications Authority received new plans containing the links between The Philippines and Taiwan only. Although the 12,800-kilometre long cable had already been laid, the US Federal Communications Commission has not given the go-ahead for it to operate.
Facebook, Google and Amazon are among the tech giants involved in the Pacific Light Cable Network Project. The companies were working on the project with The Peng Group, a Chinese Broadband giant.
The Project was announced in 2016. Google at the time explained that the cable would provide enough capacity to facilitate 80 million concurrent HD video calls between HongKong and Los Angeles.
There have been growing tensions between the US and China with the former citing fears of National Security.
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Prof Alan Woodward, a cybersecurity expert at Surrey University said that the decision could prove to be counterproductive for the US.
“The whole purpose of having the cable join with Hong Kong was that Hong Kong was meant to become an Asian hub so that US tech firms could start to gain more Asian customers,” he said.
He said it was understandable that the US wanted to protect itself from China’s espionage, as the same also happens in Western countries. He gave an example that the British Intelligence service have an office near Bude in Cornwall, which is the entry point of several transatlantic cables into the UK, albeit with classified information.
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“The US government has in some ways shot their own tech firms in the foot. They’re worried about the influence of Chinese tech firms, but this is preventing US companies from getting into the region at all.”
Geoffrey Stark, FCC Commissioner, agreed that the US was at risk of China spying on them using the data transmitted through the cables and said he would continue speaking out regarding the matter.
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