NATO allies Britain, Norway and the United States reportedly disrupted a covert Russian operation near Norway’s Svalbard archipelago earlier this year. Western officials told Reuters that Russian deep-sea vessels were conducting an exercise involving technology designed to disable critical undersea fibre-optic cables.
The operation involved Russia’s Main Directorate of Deep Sea Research, known as GUGI, which used deep-sea submersibles to simulate the deployment of the suspected sabotage technology. British, Norwegian and U.S. forces tracked and confronted the Russian vessels, preventing them from completing the exercise before they eventually left the area.
The incident has raised fresh concerns over the security of undersea infrastructure that carries vital internet, communications and satellite data. Two major fibre-optic cables connect Svalbard with mainland Norway, and Western officials fear such infrastructure could become a target in a wider confrontation between Russia and NATO.