(UPDATE) DUBAI — Undersea cable cuts in the Red Sea disrupted internet access Sunday in parts of Asia and the Middle East, experts said, though it wasn’t immediately clear what caused the incident.
There has been concern about the cables being targeted in a Red Sea campaign by Yemen’s Houthi rebels, which the rebels describe as an effort to pressure Israel to end its war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
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Microsoft announced via a status website that the Mideast “may experience increased latency due to undersea fiber cuts in the Red Sea.”
The Redmond, Washington-based firm did not immediately elaborate, though it said that internet traffic not moving through the Middle East “is not impacted.”
NetBlocks, which monitors internet access, said “a series of subsea cable outages in the Red Sea has degraded internet connectivity in multiple countries,” which it said included India and Pakistan.
It blamed “failures affecting the SMW4 and IMEWE cable systems near Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.”
The Southeast Asia–Middle East–Western Europe 4 cable is run by Tata Communications, part of the Indian conglomerate.
Undersea cables cut in the Red Sea, disrupting internet access in Asia and the Mideast
The India-Middle East-Western Europe cable is run by another consortium overseen by Alcatel-Lucent.
Both firms did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Saudi Arabia did not immediately acknowledge the disruption and authorities there did not respond to a request for comment.
In the United Arab Emirates, home to Dubai and Abu Dhabi, internet users on the country’s state-owned Du and Etisalat networks complained of slower internet speeds.
The government did not immediately acknowledge the disruption.
The lines being cut came as Yemen’s Houthi rebels remain locked in a series of attacks targeting Israel over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.
Israel has responded with airstrikes, including one that killed top leaders within the rebel movement.
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