[113354] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: Outside plant protection, fiber cuts, interwebz down oh noes!
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Ravi Pina)
Fri Apr 10 01:53:38 2009
Date: Fri, 10 Apr 2009 01:51:16 -0400
From: Ravi Pina <ravi@cow.org>
To: JC Dill <jcdill.lists@gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <49DED7A1.6090809@gmail.com>
Cc: "nanog@nanog.org" <nanog@nanog.org>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces+nanog.discuss=bloom-picayune.mit.edu@nanog.org
On Thu, Apr 09, 2009 at 10:22:41PM -0700, JC Dill wrote:
> Ravi Pina wrote:
> >
> >That said one would *hope* vault access
> >is not trivial and there are mechanisms in place to alert of
> >unauthorized, unlawful entry.
>
> I regularly drove on these roads when these lines were being put in
> up-and-down the SF Peninsula. There are 4 manhole covers every 1/4 mile
> or so that provide access to this fiber. Do the math. Multiply by the
> number of miles of fiber runs across the world, and the number of access
> points per mile on each run. Exactly how do you plan to make "vault
> access non-trivial" and yet make the access as easy as it needs to be
> for routine maintenance and repair?
Having never been in a vault or know how to get in one other than
apparently lifting a manhole cover I can't possible answer that
with anything more than guessing.
> My guess is that it is probably less expensive in the long run to leave
> them unprotected and just fix the problems when they occur than to try
> to "secure" the vaults and deal with the costs and extended outage
> delays when access it "secured" and it takes longer to get into a vault
> to fix things.
I wasn't thinking Exodus/C&W/SAVVIS/Whoever level security, but
considering communications cables traverse such sites it is hardly
unreasonable to think they could implement some alarm that is
centrally monitored by a NOC. I'm guessing *anything* is better
than what appears to be the *nothing* that is in place now.
Also not to get sensationalist, but less expensive than a life that
could be lost if an emergency call can't be put through?
-r
