NATO has launched a $2.5 million, two-year project to develop a resilient internet infrastructure to ensure the flow of information should undersea fiber communications be disrupted.
Under the initiative, partially funded by NATO’s Science for Peace and Security program, the alliance aims to produce a hybrid network for internet services using underground sea cables and communication satellites.
According to Eyup Turmus, SPS adviser and program manager, NATO will tap university experts and industry technologies with international partners to address the challenges and build a prototype for testing at a defense innovation acceleration center in Sweden. Project implementation is imminent, he said.
Viasat, Sierra Space and Syndis are among the companies that have expressed their intention to join the effort, officially known as Hybrid Space and Submarine Architecture to Ensure Information Security of Telecommunications, or HEIST.
Craig Miller, president of Global Space Networks at Viasat, told Bloomberg that the company will help develop the technologies for real-time data rerouting as part of the HEIST project.