Three Republican House lawmakers on Monday asked the CEOs of Alphabet, Facebook parent Meta, Amazon.com and Microsoft if they have adopted adequate safeguards to address growing national security concerns on submarine communications
Three Republican House lawmakers on Monday asked the CEOs of Alphabet, Facebook parent Meta, Amazon.com and Microsoft if they have adopted adequate safeguards to address growing national security concerns on submarine communications cables.
Washington has been raising alarm about the network of more than 400 subsea cables that handle 99% of international internet traffic and about threats from China and Russia.
The letter raised concerns that entities affiliated with China "such as SBSS, Huawei Marine, China Telecom, and China Unicom, have continued to provide maintenance or servicing to cable systems in which your companies maintain direct or indirect operational involvement or ownership." The letter was signed by Representative John Moolenaar, who chairs a House panel on China, and also by Republican representatives Carlos Gimenez and Keith Self, who chair subcommittees.
The Chinese embassy in Washington did not immediately comment.
The tech companies did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The letter said the committees are "examining the extent to which foreign adversarial actors are positioning themselves, both overtly and covertly, to compromise subsea cable systems at key points of vulnerability."
The lawmakers want the companies to disclose by August 8 whether they are aware of any instances of suspected hardware
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