Long-distance internet cables have been cut in sabotage attacks in France, disrupting internet services across the country – the second disruption during the Paris Olympics after a high-speed train line was targeted in a series of arson attacks just hours before the games started.
France’s deputy digital minister, Marina Ferrari, said on X that multiple “affects” occurred in several locations across France early Monday morning, affecting telecommunications operators and causing “localized effects” on fiber optic services and mobile internet connections. Internet companies confirmed the damage.
The French Ministry of the Interior, which oversees the country’s police forces, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. France’s cybersecurity agency, ANSSI, told WIRED that the issues are not related to a cybersecurity incident.
At the time of writing, no one has claimed responsibility for either attack. Authorities have yet to identify suspects responsible for the cable-cutting sabotage, but believe the train disruption may have been carried out by people with “far-left” political leanings.
The Olympic series of incidents comes as Russia has been accused of spreading a wave of disinformation targeting France and has also been linked to a range of potential subversive acts in Europe.
France’s second-largest telecommunications company, SFR, appears to be one of the companies hardest hit by the vandalism. “Between 1am and 3am last night, our long-distance fiber optic network was disrupted in five locations,” an SFR spokesperson told WIRED. SFR said its maintenance teams were working to repair the damage and that the impact to customers was “limited.”
“Also affected are between three and eight other carriers that use our long distance network,” the spokesperson said.
Nicolas Guillaume, CEO of telecommunications company Nasca Group, which owns ISP company Netalis, told WIRED he believes the destruction was “deliberate” and that ISPs serving both consumers and businesses are affected. Some of the damaged cables appear to have been cleanly severed, according to images he shared with X. Guillaume said it was likely someone opened the ducts where the cables were stored and cut them. Internet company Free 1337 also confirmed that it was working to repair the damage.
While billions of people around the world use wireless connections, the internet’s foundation is made up of cables that cross borders and run under the sea. This infrastructure can automatically reroute traffic to minimize disruptions, but it can be fragile and vulnerable to attacks and disruptions. EU politicians are calling for improved security for internet infrastructure.
However, this is not the first time that French internet cables have been damaged by deliberate acts: at the end of April 2022, a key long-distance internet cable around Paris was deliberately cut and damaged, causing an outage that affected around 10 internet and infrastructure companies.
In that incident, cables appeared to be surgically cut almost simultaneously in three locations north, south and east of Paris, according to photos released by telecommunications companies. Thousands of people around Paris, and even further afield from the French capital, suffered temporary internet blackouts as network operators rerouted traffic. “This is the work of experts,” Guillaume said at the time.
Arthur PB Laudrain, a postdoctoral research fellow in cyber diplomacy at King’s College London, said the recent incidents appear to be “less severe” than the 2022 outages. “Such actions are well within the realm of far-left, environmental or anarchist groups, especially if they benefit from insider support or knowledge (current or former rail or network workers),” Laudrain said. “However, we cannot exclude the possibility that state actors are encouraging, supporting or directing such domestic groups to provide plausible deniability to their involvement.”
