There have been calls for Ireland to increase its defence spending to ensure the protection of undersea cables.
Chair of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee Jim Risch said that Ireland's "strategic position" comes with "significant responsibility".
Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, meanwhile said the spend on protecting subsea cables should be doubled.
Questions have been raised over the safety of the vital undersea cables in and around Irish waters and whose job it is to protect them.
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But where exactly are they? The graphic above shows how of the 550+ international subsea cables, nearly 75% pass through or close to Irish waters.
Around 97% of the world's communications and internet traffic travels through a network of undersea fiber-optic cables - hosting banking systems, businesses, social media and other forms of critical communications.
Three quarters of those cables in the northern hemisphere pass through, or are close to, Ireland.
