FCC grants Google permission to operate a portion of the 8,000-mile Pacific Light Cable Network System between the US and Taiwan, but not Hong Kong
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Wednesday approved Alphabet Inc unit Google's (GOOGL.O) …
Context & Ripple Effects
Google and Facebook had spent early 2020 fighting for this cable: their [[a:950362|February filing asked the FCC to activate the PLCN while excluding Hong Kong and the Chinese section]], a retreat from the original plan even before Washington weighed in. In June the [[a:955052|DOJ formally objected to the Hong Kong landing, calling it an unprecedented espionage opportunity for the Chinese government]].
Wednesday's decision splits the difference: the FCC grants Google operating authority for the US-Taiwan segment of the 8,000-mile system but withholds it for Hong Kong, effectively ratifying the DOJ's position. It is the first time the commission has carved a single cable into approved and disapproved halves along geopolitical lines.
First-order effects
- Google can now light the Taiwan leg of PLCN, but Facebook — co-applicant on the system — gets no path to Hong Kong, leaving capacity aimed at the territory stranded without a landing license.
- The Hong Kong segment stays dark indefinitely, since the FCC's grant covers only the portion between the US and Taiwan.
Second-order effects
- Within months Google and Facebook stop trying to salvage the Hong Kong landing altogether: by August they refile the project with Hong Kong removed entirely, keeping Taiwan and the Philippines.
- The pair redirect their capital toward routes with no China-adjacent terminus, culminating in the Japan-Singapore-Taiwan-Guam-Philippines-Indonesia cable announced for 2024 — a design that reads like a map of everywhere except Hong Kong.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, US national-security review becomes a de facto routing constraint on all trans-Pacific subsea builds, forcing hyperscalers to pre-design networks around which landings Washington will tolerate rather than seek forgiveness afterward.
- Cable consortia lose Hong Kong as the region's default switching hub, accelerating a structural shift toward Taiwan, Guam, and Southeast Asian landings for traffic that once would have transited Chinese territory.
The trend: US regulators are treating undersea cable landings as national-security chokepoints, and hyperscalers are redrawing trans-Pacific network maps to route around Hong Kong and China.