Powerful solar flares are capable of provoking the internet disabling worldwide. Such a prediction made in his report at the conference Sigcomm 2021 Researcher from USA Sanga Abdu Dzhii.
Solar flares, accompanied by coronal emissions – one of the most powerful transient phenomena in the solar system. However, powerful solar flares are rarely observed – all of the three well-known occurred before the Internet era. However, after three decades of low solar activity, the likelihood that such an event will occur is.
Therefore, the Associate Professor of the University of California in Irquine Sangita Abdu Gioti decided to assess their threat. According to the researcher’s estimates, the greatest threat of solar flares are submitted for underwater Internet highways connecting entire countries. Despite the fact that the fiber itself is not affected by geomagnetic-induced flash currents, electronics are vulnerable to every 50-100 kilometers of repeaters. At the same time, for different cables, the risk will differ. So, Southeast Asia suffers less: the Internet highway is shorter there, and the larger damage solar flash will apply in high latitudes. Long cables connecting the US and Europe are subject to the greatest risk. For local and regional Internet infrastructure, the threat is minimal, since the cables are grounded there quite often.
Even a powerful solar flare will not lead to the full disabling of the Internet, recognizes a jiotic, but it is able to seriously destabilize it. In addition, such a phenomenon dismiss all the equipment on earthly orbit, which will deprive the humanity of satellite Internet and global positioning systems.