Protection of pipelines and infrastructure: The explosions in the Baltic Sea have opened everyone’s eyes

Pipelines are lifelines. Millions of kilometers of oil, gas and water pipelines serve companies as well as individuals. They supply us underground, through cities, countries, continents. And anyone who opens a website receives data packets across the sea in fractions of a second.

At the beginning of 2020, around 406 submarine cables with a length of 1.2 million kilometers were in operation worldwide. Today there are even more. According to Google estimates, 98 percent of international Internet traffic is handled via undersea cables. All of this now seems threatened by sabotage since the leaks in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 Baltic Sea pipelines.

200 billion for infrastructure protection

Hence the pithy announcement by the military of western states that they know how to protect the security of pipelines, networks and systems in a robust manner. Or that of Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser that 20 billion euros would be used for this in the next ten years: to join forces and ramp up protective measures. That is the plan.

But protection against whom exactly, and how much will be possible? This is one of the reasons why it is necessary to find out who is responsible for the sabotage of the Baltic Sea pipelines. A guerrilla? Or Russia? Or, as is also speculated on social networks, the USA?

After the Russian mobilization and the renewed nuclear threat, they would then send a warning to the Kremlin: We are going to the lifelines of your economy. And the long-criticized Nord Stream pipelines would also be useless once and for all. No, the Russians have a lot to say, say the secret services. But the enlightenment of the Danes, Swedes, Germans, others, with secret services and the Navy still needs time.

But even if the federal police are at sea with all their strength – that’s not enough.

Stephan Andreas Casdorff

Faeser and her options: She wants to create powers for security agencies to avert danger that go beyond mere reconnaissance. But even if the federal police are at sea with all their strength – that’s not enough. Vulnerability can be counted in kilometers.

It is therefore probable that NATO countries will soon have an even stronger joint impact on IT infrastructures, counter-strike so to speak, in order to at least weaken serious attacks – cyber and others – on the general infrastructure.

Targeted attacks against the energy sector are increasing. Attacks on “neuralgic hubs” such as gas or electricity stations can cause major damage. They are also pretty well protected – pipelines or power lines with a length of thousands of kilometers are less. The sabotage of Nord Stream 1 and 2 has opened the eyes of everyone around the world. Maybe just in time.

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Source: Tagesspiegel

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