Two vital subsea communications cables off the coast of Perth have suffered sudden, consecutive faults, triggering urgent calls for a federal police investigation and raising fresh concerns over the vulnerability of Australia's digital lifelines.

The disruptions occurred over the weekend within the Perth Cable Protection Zone, which extends 60 nautical miles off City Beach to a depth of 2,000 meters. Bevan Slattery, Chief Executive of cable infrastructure provider Subco, raised the alarm after the two separate cables experienced faults in rapid succession and in close proximity to one another.

Describing the incident as highly concerning, Mr. Slattery called on the Australian Federal Police (AFP) to urgently investigate the cause. In a statement, an AFP spokesperson confirmed the agency had received a report of a crime regarding the matter and is currently assessing the information provided.

A Critical Economic Lifeline

The incident highlights the fragile nature of Australia's connection to the global digital economy. Dr. David Brewster, a senior research fellow at the National Security College at the Australian National University, emphasized that these undersea cables are the invisible backbone of modern Australian society.

"Australia has 16 subsea cables that carry 99 per cent of our international communications," Dr. Brewster said. "It's really fundamental to the Australian economy and our daily life, and if they were to be disrupted or cease, it would have a massive impact on our country."

Dr. Brewster warned that almost every cloud-based service, online search, and mobile application relies entirely on these underwater connections to function.

Accidents versus Sabotage

Lying on the ocean floor and measuring roughly the width of a standard garden hose, subsea cables are highly exposed. While accidental damage from ship anchors is common, the threat of deliberate sabotage is becoming an increasing geopolitical reality.

"We've seen numerous incidents in Europe and around Taiwan over the last, say, three or four years of cables being cut," Dr. Brewster noted. "It's difficult to be absolutely certain of the reasons in some of these cases, but in a great number of cases, it's fairly obvious that they were done by state actors."

To mitigate these risks, Dr. Brewster suggests Australia's best defense is redundancy. By laying more cables across diverse routes, the nation can ensure that a single localized outage does not cripple international communications.

Who Calls the Shots?

The incident has also cast a spotlight on regulatory gaps and foreign ownership of critical infrastructure. Many of the cables connecting Australia to the world are privately owned by global technology giants such as Meta, Google, and Amazon.

This high level of foreign private ownership limits the Australian government’s direct leverage over how these cables are secured, operated, or repaired. Compounding the issue is the lack of a single, centralized government agency responsible for undersea infrastructure.

"We need to nominate an agency to take responsibility for protecting the cables and any response," Dr. Brewster urged. "Who do you call when a cable is being cut or disrupted? For many private operators, it's really not clear to them who takes responsibility within government."