Building Cooperative Frameworks for Subsea Cable Security in the Indo-Pacific

Commentary by Taylar Rajic

Published March 24, 2026

As the Indo-Pacific region further expands its global economic power, subsea fiber-optic cables will play an essential role in regional growth and stability, while also acting as a frontline in broader strategic competition. Subsea cables are essential to daily functioning in the region-they carry 95 percent of the world's data, making them crucial pieces of digital infrastructure. Japan, for example, alone hosts at least 20 subsea cable landing stations, which serve as critical conduits for the island's internet and data connectivity with the rest of Asia and the wider world. The Indo-Pacific is home to numerous subsea cables, including in the South China Sea, meaning these systems are increasingly at risk due to the evolving security landscape. Subsea cables are proliferating across the region as digitalization continues and as the growing need for cloud computing, streaming, and e-commerce fuel investments in enhanced connectivity.

Cable networks in the Indo-Pacific run through a complex regional landscape shaped by a high volume of maritime trade and economic activity as well as shifting geopolitical tensions. The region is home to three of the world's largest economies-China, India, and Japan-and is responsible for more than a third of global economic activity. It also includes numerous emerging and developing economies, creating a regional landscape of disparate response capabilities to subsea cables threats and disruptions. As this landscape continues to evolve, government and private sector cooperation is essential to adapting to and overcoming threats to subsea cables and the broader maritime security environment.

Most damage to subsea cables is accidental, with a majority of issues caused by natural disasters, fishing, and genuine maritime accidents, but these systems also face potential threats from malicious actors who may seek to deliberately sabotage cables and therefore disrupt a country or region's connectivity. The regulatory environment surrounding subsea cables runs on outdated maritime laws that complicate mitigating and preventing such behavior. In a low-probability but high-impact situation where cables are cut intentionally, malicious actors can take advantage of a cloak of plausible deniability. Regulatory harmonization through easing and streamlining permitting processes would allow private companies to build cables more easily, enhance redundancy, and strengthen resilience. A more robust subsea cable ecosystem, governed by updated regulations, would therefore help protect against future cases of sabotage.

Addressing Structural Governance Gaps

The global maritime system creates further challenges in managing this issue. Any transoceanic cable is going to begin and end in different jurisdictions, often crossing international waters and exclusive economic zones governed by varying legal standards. Currently, there is no sufficient forum in which to adjudicate issues as they arise. Many of these challenges reflect broader maritime legal tools that are outdated or too convoluted for addressing today's realities. Progress in protecting the security of subsea cables is plagued by lax oversight over the flagging of ships, an insufficient global cable-laying fleet, and high shipbuilding costs for new cable-laying and repair vessels. Existing governing frameworks and organizations, including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the International Cable Protection Committee, and the International Telecommunications Union, were not formed with the scale of digital dependency and hybrid maritime threats in mind that exist today.

Addressing these threats requires both national capacity building and coordinated regional action. First, each government must strengthen its own maritime domain awareness systems. This initiative should include enhanced seabed mapping, vessel tracking, anomaly detection, and integration of AI-assisted pattern recognition into national security architectures. However, isolated awareness is insufficient. Real deterrence will come from structured information-sharing agreements across Indo-Pacific partners, enabling rapid cross-border data exchange when suspicious activity occurs. Additionally, broader enforcement mechanisms and meaningful penalties for failing to adhere to maritime laws and regulations are urgently needed. This should include expanding legal authorities to investigate and sanction deliberate cable interference, enforcing stricter oversight of open registries, and linking maritime insurance, port access, and repair permissions to compliance standards. These advancements would help deter not only accidents but also any potential deliberate cuts through limiting the scope for plausible deniability. This effort should include heavy penalties, via both fiscal costs and reputational damage, to improve the security of subsea cables immediately in conjunction with structural policy changes. Raising the stakes and costs of cable cuts would not only deter cable sabotage but also deliver on the daily threats and challenges facing both the private and public sectors.

Managing the Complex Web of Regulations

The regulatory hurdles in this sector prevent the quick repair of severed cables and represent a growing issue that requires government and private sector cooperation. Private companies already face insurance challenges for cuts in conflict zones, as demonstrated by the September 2025 Red Sea cuts that disrupted internet access across Asia and the Middle East. Although it wasn't clear who caused the incident, insurance premiums surged as high as 50 percent for cable repair ships to enter the region due to the risk of vessels being targeted by Yemen's Houthi rebels.

Natural disasters and maritime accidents represent a large source of risk in the Indo-Pacific. Japan is uniquely susceptible to both due to its major fishing industry and elevated seismic activity, putting it at risk to earthquakes, tsunamis, and landslides that can significantly damage cables. For example, communications and internet access in the region was disrupted due to extensive damage from the March 2011 Tohoku earthquake. The continued risk from these disasters requires improved emergency response capabilities, including rapid readiness for repair capacity and redundancy to reroute during an emergency.

With the growing dependency on this infrastructure, governments in the Indo-Pacific need to develop a coordinated, expedited process for issuing permits for installations and repairs during emergencies. The Indo-Pacific spans multiple "maintenance zones" that are governed by different permitting rules, laws, security clearances, and environmental regulations. By having a coordinated approach to "common-sense" waivers for repair ships in multiple jurisdictions, governments can cut down the time required for vessels to procure permits and ease the navigation of conflicting requirements and deadlines due to different maintenance zones.

During a crisis, permitting delays for repair ships could isolate island nations and disrupt essential civilian and military communications. While satellites can provide some connectivity in a crisis, they cannot support the volume of data that modern connectivity and industry demand. The subsea cable industry is attempting to address the challenges it faces in cross-border operations, but there is no sufficient, region-wide emergency permitting mechanism in the Indo-Pacific. An immediate approach to remedying this would be to utilize existing regional multilateral organizations to set standards and facilitate rapid responses.

ASEAN, an international body comprised of 11 member states, already sets guidelines and plans for securing subsea cables. This grouping could be further utilized to institutionalize crisis response mechanisms and threat information sharing. The organization and others would need to work in conjunction with the global technical industry coordination body, the International Cable Protection Committee (ICPC), which articulates best practices and integrates expertise from all regions. Regional governments should develop a coordinated framework that pre-authorizes repair vessels to operate across multiple maintenance zones during defined emergencies. In addition, pre-negotiated, common-sense waivers would streamline response timelines and reduce bureaucratic friction.

Governments must also assess how much repair capacity the region truly needs. Overbuilding repair ships risks distorting the market, yet underinvestment leaves strategic gaps. Targeted public-private risk guarantees and pooled regional funding for standby vessels could correct current market disincentives while maintaining commercially viable fleets.

Strengthening Resiliency Through Market Incentives

Building resiliency in cable systems is not always economical, which is why governments need to explore mechanisms to encourage the industry to prepare for emergency situations. Hyperscalers-the major tech companies that are currently investing heavily in data and subsea cables globally-optimize for efficiency, latency, and return on investment. Having excess repair ships in a fleet is costly and not an appealing option to the small handful of private companies that operate and repair subsea cables. Governments need to assess the credible risks to subsea cables and determine how much supply is actually needed to avoid over capacity.

Currently, there are 62 vessels globally that are engaged in the laying and maintenance of subsea cables. Of these, 19 are contracted to provide subsea maintenance service and 26 vessels are operating in cable installation, with the remaining 16 switching between both in an ad hoc capacity. The fleet of maintenance vessels is smaller and aging, and due to investment constraints, operators generally prefer converting secondhand vessels for maintenance purposes rather than building entirely new ships, which can take three to five years to commission. Ultimately, new cable ships are not being built and added to fleets at the same rate as older ships are being retired.

This issue is particularly pressing in the Indo-Pacific, as studies forecast that cables in the Southwest Pacific region (including the South China Sea) will require 141 repairs (representing 49 percent of global faults) in 2040. At least eight new maintenance vessels are estimated to be required in the region by 2040 to keep up with the evolving risk environment.

As a result, governments need to consider policy mechanisms that align market incentives with national security imperatives. Japan is one of the first regional players to recognize the overall strategic importance of supporting its subsea cables maintenance and repair fleet, as it is set to support domestic champion NEC through subsidizing the cost of purchasing repair vessels. The initiative could see the Japanese government cover up to half of the cost for a new vessel to make sure the company stays competitive in the global market. NEC, rather than owning its own vessels, has historically chartered them and therefore is reliant on unpredictable timelines for repairs. If it cannot guarantee repairs as fast as its competitors, NEC could risk losing major contracts to hyperscalers entering the market.

The Indo-Pacific is also marked by economic asymmetry among advanced economies and developing states. Therefore, initiatives need to be explored that go beyond subsidies for developing states whose markets cannot afford such measures. Identifying key players in the region who could spearhead coordinated responses, such as ASEAN, and other key regional partners, including Singapore, is a key first step in establishing shared protocols for incident reporting, pooling repair logistics, and coordinating maritime domain awareness. Governments need to ensure that market incentives favor resilience-enhancing behavior over short-term cost savings. For example, new private sector projects backed by firms such as Meta have opted to route cables connecting Singapore to the West Coast of the United States via the Java Sea rather than the South China Sea. This decision reflects a commercial calculus that seeks to minimize regulatory uncertainty, geopolitical risk, and potential disruptions in contested waters. Governments in the Indo-Pacific should leverage this existing market incentive through improving transparency around maritime risks, offering insurance incentives for diversified routing, conditioning public procurement on redundancy standards, and supporting shared regional repair capacity.

Policy Recommendations

Addressing the evolving threats to subsea cable security in the Indo-Pacific requires a concerted regional effort and pragmatic steps that expand public-private partnerships, monitoring, and contingency planning for shared repair capacity. By reducing ambiguity and fragmentation, Indo-Pacific partners can narrow the zone of plausible deniability and mitigate one of the most pressing challenges to critical global digital infrastructure.

1. Streamline emergency waivers through a "coalition of the willing."
   Indo-Pacific partners should move beyond ad hoc coordination and establish a pre-negotiated emergency permitting framework among a multilateral coalition of the willing. This should include key government players from Japan, Singapore, and Australia to harmonize emergency permitting for cable installation and repair. This coalition could include key cable landing states, major maritime hubs, and capable naval powers.
   
2. Expand the stack in Pax Silica to include trusted infrastructure down to subsea cables.
   The emerging Pax Silica frameworkfor trusted digital infrastructure, which already includes several Indo-Pacific partners, should explicitly incorporate subsea cables as foundational strategic assets. In practice, this should involve including subsea cables in trusted vendor and supply chain standards alongside other existing critical technologies such as semiconductors and cloud infrastructure. This would help reframe subsea cables from being viewed as passive infrastructure to strategic assets and reflect a full-stack approach to digital resilience.
   
3. Leverage private investment to bolster resilience and foster private-public partnerships through Track 1.5 dialogues.
   Considering that subsea cables are primarily privately owned and operated, there must be a more concerted effort to institutionalize public-private coordination in this sector. Track 1.5 dialogues that bring together governments, cable operators, insurers, shipbuilders, and technology firms should become institutionalized rather than episodic. These dialogues should produce joint risk assessments that utilize private sector data and government national security insights. They should also prioritize the development of insurance backstops to cover emergency situations such as natural disasters or potential deliberate sabotage.
   
4. Create a forum for Indo-Pacific governments to communicate regarding cable infrastructure.
   There is currently no dedicated multilateral body focused on subsea cable protection and repair coordination in the Indo-Pacific. This body should facilitate real-time information sharing during a crisis, coordinate maritime domain awareness related to subsea infrastructure, and develop a shared framework for attribution and diplomatic responses. It should also coordinate joint exercises and contingency planning for large-scale disruptions.
   
5. Address and enforce broader maritime issues.
   Indo-Pacific partners should leverage existing multilateral bodies, such as ASEAN, to regularly enforce issues affecting the broader maritime environment through statutory powers to detect, investigate, and penalize intentional damage to submarine cables. This would help in deterring accidental cuts by raising the stakes and forcing attentiveness from crews who might otherwise act more carelessly, providing dual coverage to both accidents and any potential deliberate sabotage to cables. This must be achieved through tightening regulatory scrutiny of underperforming open registries and conditioning access to maritime insurance, port entry, and repair authorizations on demonstrable compliance with established standards. Beyond regulatory measures, advanced technologies can be used to aid maintenance and repairs, including through enhanced seabed mapping, vessel tracking, anomaly detection, and integration of AI-assisted pattern recognition into national security architectures.

As the Indo-Pacific region continues to rapidly digitize, the resiliency of its digital infrastructure is emerging as a central national security priority. Subsea cables form the backbone of this infrastructure, carrying the vast majority of the region's internet traffic, data flows, and communications. Safeguarding these networks will require stronger coordination among governments as well as deeper collaboration with private sector operators. Strengthening these partnerships and improving collective monitoring, protection, and response mechanisms will be essential to ensuring the resilience and security of the Indo-Pacific's subsea cable system.

Taylar Rajic is an associate fellow with the Strategic Technologies Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C.

Programs & Projects