FCC tightens submarine cable rules to curb Chinese equipment makers

The Federal Communications Commission voted Thursday to tighten submarine cable rules, creating a first-time licensing requirement for owners and operators of submarine line terminal equipment, the gear that links undersea cables to U.S. terrestrial networks. It also eased approvals for some applicants that can clear national-security checks.

Submarine cable systems carry the vast majority of the world’s internet traffic and support consumer, commercial and defense communications. They carry cloud services, financial data, video calls and cross-border business traffic between continents.

The new order, adopted as FCC 26-42, was approved by Chairman Brendan Carr and Commissioners Anna Gomez and Olivia Trusty. It lets some applicants qualify for a presumptive exemption from Team Telecom review if they certify to high security standards, have operated cables without incident and agree to ongoing oversight and monitoring. SLTE is one of the most vulnerable parts of the network because it connects the submarine system to U.S. facilities on land.

On Aug. 7, 2025, the FCC unanimously adopted rules that were the first comprehensive overhaul of submarine cable regulation in 25 years. That 2025 order covered 90 FCC-licensed cable systems, and cable landing licensees reported more than 5.3 million Gbps of available capacity as of December 2022, along with 6.8 million Gbps of planned capacity for 2024.

The earlier rules created a presumption of denial for certain foreign-adversary-controlled applicants, limited capacity leasing agreements involving such entities and prohibited covered equipment. The Commerce Department definition of foreign adversaries includes China, including Hong Kong and Macau, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, the Russian Federation and the Maduro regime in Venezuela.

The regulatory framework dates to the Submarine Cable Act of 1888 and Executive Order 10530 of 1954.