Networks

Africa’s Data Sovereignty Is Not About Where Data Lives: It Is About Who Controls It

Africa's data sovereignty debate focuses too heavily on where information is stored. Real sovereignty depends on control of cloud platforms, encryption, identity systems, and critical digital infrastructure that determine resilience, autonomy, and strategic power. more

Time Sovereignty: Internet Policy and Defense Frameworks for Critical Infrastructure Synchronization Under Geopolitical Conflict

As power grids depend on microsecond precision, states must treat time synchronization as sovereign infrastructure, hardening satellite, fiber and orbital defenses against hybrid attacks that could trigger catastrophic blackouts through resilient sovereign time defense frameworks. more

The Internet Is Fragmenting - Most of the People Who Should Notice Aren’t Looking

The internet is fragmenting across cables, routing systems and governance. Most network engineers, focused on regional operations, are missing how technical infrastructure and state power are reshaping a once interoperable network. more

Iran Threatens Subsea Internet Cables in the Strait of Hormuz

Iran is seeking to monetize and potentially weaponize subsea internet cables beneath the Strait of Hormuz, exposing how modern geopolitical conflicts increasingly threaten the digital infrastructure underpinning global finance, communications and trade. more

Running-Code Primacy - The Patch Needed to Preserve the Internet’s Original Design

This essay argues that Internet governance has drifted from technical coordination into unaccountable institutional power, and proposes "Running-Code Primacy" as a post-RIR framework grounded in distributed validation, interoperability, and voluntary adoption rather than registry authority. more

The New Space Race for Direct-to-Device Mobile Networks

Three decades after Iridium's costly collapse, falling launch costs and improved signal processing are reviving satellite-to-phone ambitions, as Starlink, Amazon and AST SpaceMobile race to build direct-to-device networks that could reshape mobile coverage and competition. more

Building RIPE SEE: A Conversation With Jan Žorž About Community, Trust, and the Work Behind a Regional Event

Jan Žorž reflects on SEE RIPE's role in uniting a fragmented region, where trust built through informal exchange now underpins internet resilience and helps align engineers with policymakers as regulatory pressures intensify. more

Beyond Connectivity: How Submarine Cable Resilience Dictates Digital Sovereignty in the Age of Fragmented Governance

Subsea cables underpin global data flows, yet resilience, control and deep sea access now define digital sovereignty as governance fragments, hyperscalers consolidate ownership, and states prioritize survivability over efficiency in an increasingly contested geopolitical seabed. more

IP Reputation for AI Teams: The Infrastructure Concept Nobody Explains

As AI agents scale, IP reputation emerges as a hidden constraint, shaping access to external systems and degrading performance. Managing network identity, not just models, is becoming essential for reliable data collection. more

Africa’s Community Networks Offer a Local Path to Inclusive and Resilient Connectivity

Community networks, locally built and governed, are emerging across Africa as cost-effective tools to extend connectivity, bolster digital sovereignty, and improve cyber resilience, despite regulatory, financial, and technical constraints that hinder broader adoption. more

The Internet Has a New User - It’s Not You

AI agents are rapidly becoming primary internet users, with inference-driven traffic reshaping network demands and exposing infrastructure blind spots as latency-sensitive, machine-to-machine activity begins to outpace and outcompete human web behavior. more

NOGs at a Crossroads: Confronting the New Demands of Network Operations

Surging outages and mounting losses are increasingly forcing a rethink of network operations, as NOGs now confront a shift from technical exchange to strategic governance, where resilience, leadership, and institutional influence define the profession's future. more

CaribNOG Enters Its Institutional Era

CaribNOG's 32nd forum in Curaçao marks a shift from volunteer roots to institutional structure, as the Caribbean network community formalises programmes, expands research, and positions itself to tackle climate, geopolitical, and infrastructure pressures. more

The Fractured Web: How Internet Fragmentation Threatens Our Connected World

As governments, firms and engineers reshape networks, the internet is fragmenting into rival systems. Interoperability erodes, raising costs, curbing rights and weakening resilience, with global growth, innovation and cooperation increasingly at risk. more

Iran’s Record Internet Blackout Deepens Civilian Isolation, Fuels Humanitarian Concerns

Iran’s unprecedented internet blackout, imposed after February’s strikes, has reduced connectivity to near zero, tightened state control over information, and set a global precedent for wartime digital isolation with significant humanitarian consequences. more