Paris (AFP) — A preliminary investigation was opened on Wednesday after acts of malicious intent on an unprecedented scale on the French fiber optic network, which led to slowdowns and cuts in internet access in several major cities, including Grenoble, Besançon, Reims and Strasbourg.
The investigation was opened for “deterioration of property likely to harm the fundamental interests of the Nation”, “obstructing an automated data processing system” and “criminal association”, announced the Paris prosecutor’s office.
The investigations, said this source, were entrusted to the DGSI, internal intelligence, and to the Central Directorate of the Judicial Police (DCPJ).
“This kind of incident of this magnitude never happens,” a source familiar with the matter told AFP. “It’s the first time and we don’t know who it is, for the moment,” she continued, indicating that monitoring devices had been put in place to prevent this from happening elsewhere.
– Repairs in progress –
At the end of the day, the Zone ADSL site had identified 9,741 breakdowns on the fixed Internet in France in the past 24 hours, mainly disturbing the customers of the operator Free and to a lesser extent SFR.
At 6:00 p.m., connections were “restored in the affected areas”, announced the French telecoms federation, on behalf of all operators.
“Repair work on the cables is nevertheless very heavy and is still ongoing at present,” she added.
“The attacks took place last night at 4 a.m. Since this morning, the teams have been mobilized,” operator Free told AFP.
Several of its customers have complained on Twitter that they no longer have any internet speed via their Freebox after a blackout that occurred during the night.
“Three of Free’s four thoroughfares,” known as the “backbone,” “have been vandalized,” other sources said.
SFR, for its part, noted “several fiber cuts” around Lyon and in Ile-de-France, confirming the trail of vandalism.
According to initial findings, these are “long-distance” inter-regional fiber optic cables that run along highways, railways and waterways, which have been deliberately cut in several places, including the Paris-Lyon and Paris link -Strasbourg.
On the other hand, their competitor Bouygues Telecom “does not use the links affected by these malfunctions and mobile and fixed services are provided normally,” the group told AFP.
Orange is also not affected by the cuts, according to one of its spokespersons.
– “Digital terrorism”? –
The backbone of an Internet network, the “backbone” is used to interconnect Internet traffic between different geographical areas using very high-speed fibers.
“It’s a kind of fiber + hub +”, explains an industrialist in the sector. “When you cut that, you cut off access to an entire region.”
A cut can however be circumvented thanks to the interconnection of the networks and the operators can thus provide a degraded service.
“It’s a bit like if highways were cut, and traffic had to be redirected to national ones,” commented Sami Slim, managing director of Telehouse, one of the hubs of internet traffic in France.
“Is this an act of digital terrorism? Maybe. There was a major impact there because the coordination of the attacks on the cables was done well, by people who inevitably know the network”, estimates with AFP Nicolas Guillaume, leader of the alternative operator dedicated to professionals Netalis.
The latter, who intends to file a complaint, suffered “either very strong slowdowns (in traffic), or rare service interruptions for a little over 2 hours” in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region.
“Given the essential and strategic nature of networks today, such cuts are likely to have dramatic consequences,” lamented Philippe Le Grand, president of InfraNum, a federation that brings together all digital infrastructure manufacturers. French.
“We reiterate our call on the future government to intensify the fight and prevention against these acts of vandalism and we call for tougher criminal penalties against their perpetrators,” pleaded Arthur Dreyfuss, president of the Federation. French telecommunications.
In March 2020, telecom cables were intentionally cut in Ile-de-France, Vitry and Ivry (Val-de-Marne), temporarily depriving tens of thousands of Orange subscribers of internet access while data centers were seeing their operations disrupted.
An investigation had been opened but one of the parties to the case told AFP on Wednesday that they had “no news from the authorities” on this subject.
Agefi-Dow Jones The financial newswire
Dow Jones Newswires
April 27, 2022 13:12 ET (17:12 GMT)