TAT-8 transatlantic fiber-optic cable
Cable submarino transatlántico de fibra óptica (TAT-8)
- Date
- 1988 · confidence high
- Place
- Tuckerton, New Jersey, United States – Widemouth Bay, United Kingdom – Penmarch, France
- Credited to
- AT&T, British Telecom and France Télécom; forerunner TAT-1 coaxial telephone cable (1956)
- Field
- Communication
What it is
First transoceanic fibre-optic cable, with 40,000 simultaneous telephone circuits. It inaugurated the physical network of submarine fibre that now carries 99 per cent of intercontinental traffic.
What it led to
- The globalisation of finance and offshore call centres
- The internet as a planetary physical network dependent on vulnerable cables
- Mass surveillance of communications at landing points
Built on
Made possible
- global internet
- cross-border e-commerce
- intercontinental streaming