You probably think your data floats through the air.

[brian_greenberg@infosec.exchange]

You probably think your data floats through the air. It actually sits in the mud. Engineers are currently pulling the world's first fiber-optic ocean cable off the Atlantic floor. TAT-8 changed the world in 1988 by turning your voice into pulses of light. It only lasted 14 years before it broke, but it proved we could wire the planet. We're recycling the metals now. Workers have to coil the glass fibers by hand on a ship to prevent them from snapping. It's a reminder that our life depends on thin strands of glass sitting in the dark.

🧠 TAT-8 carried 40,000 phone calls at once.
Sharks used to bite the early trial cables.
The ship crew is recycling 1,012 km of line.

https://www.wired.com/story/say-goodbye-to-the-undersea-cable-that-made-the-global-internet-possible/
#InternetHistory #Technology #Telecoms