Why Should We Care About if the Ocean Floor is Now a Battleground? | with Trent Fulcher

Nearly all global internet traffic quietly moves through fiber-optic undersea cables on the seabed, yet most people still think of the internet as “the cloud.” In this episode, Ray Powell and Jim Carouso sit down with Trent Fulcher, CEO of Starboard Maritime Intelligence, to explore what he calls “the end of the benign seabed.”Drawing on real cases, from a suspicious cable cut off Taiwan to fishing fleets and shadow tankers across key maritime chokepoints, Trent explains how vessels can mask their identities, spoof locations, and drag anchors over critical infrastructure while hiding behind flags of convenience. He breaks down why around 95% of internet traffic still relies on subsea cables, why repair delays can stretch to 45 days, and how new data fusion and behavioral analytics are shifting the industry from reactive incident response to proactive prevention.The conversation digs into who is most vulnerable (from Pacific Island states to cable-dependent hubs like New Zealand and Singapore), how governments and cable operators are building joint defenses, and what smaller Indo-Pacific nations can realistically do with limited navies and budgets.If you care about maritime security, great-power competition over Taiwan, or the future of the oceans, this episode will change how you think about the internet and the battle now being waged on the ocean floor.Subscribe for your weekly Indo-Pacific briefing.Follow Trent Fulcher on LinkedIn Follow us on X, @IndoPacPodcast, LinkedIn or FacebookFollow Ray Powell on X, @GordianKnotRay, or LinkedIn, or check out his maritime transparency work at SeaLightFollow Jim Carouso on LinkedInSponsored by BowerGroupAsia, a strategic advisory firm that specializes in the Indo-Pacific