When disasters strike the physical digital infrastructure that keeps societies running, it can have catastrophic effects the world should prepare for like any other potential crisis, writes Tomas Lamanauskas, deputy secretary general of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

Imagine a world without instant messaging or social media. Hard to picture, isn’t it? Today, our society relies on a fragile web of digital lifelines. In 2025, there were an estimated 376 billion emails sent and received each day globally. But what would happen if these systems were to suddenly fail?

When we think about digital threats, we usually picture cyberattacks, ransomware, or AI misuse. But these dangers, although very real, are only the tip of the iceberg.

Think about a heatwave knocking out a data centre, a ship’s anchor cutting a submarine cable, or a satellite collision sending debris spinning through orbit. What starts as a simple local outage – a bug, a technical glitch – can quickly escalate into a global crisis: traffic lights failing, hospitals unable to access patient records, payments frozen, emergency services unreachable. Within hours, this outage could plunge millions, or even billions, into an unprecedented crisis.

That’s what a “digital pandemic” would look like.

The remarkable progress of our hyper-connected world rests on physical foundations: submarine cables lying on the ocean floor, satellites in orbit, data centres humming with servers, and fibre running beneath our streets, along with the power grids that keep modern life switched on. These systems carry our money and messages, drive our transport and healthcare, and enable our basic ability to function.

But these systems face risks that, if not managed, can cause them to fail at scale. And if this happens, the consequences could be catastrophic.

Unlike hurricanes or earthquakes, digital disasters don’t topple buildings or set off sirens. Systems just silently stop working, with research showing that up to 89 per cent of the digital disruptions triggered by natural hazards result not from the initial shock but from knock-on effects. As a result, the number of people affected can be ten times greater than those directly exposed to the original incident.

Recent examples show that these scenarios are not just science fiction.

In 2019, a severed submarine cable plunged the island nation of Tonga into digital darkness, bringing businesses and emergency services to a halt. In 2024, a defective software update caused system-wide outages in airlines, banking networks, and cloud services worldwide. And during Europe’s record-breaking heatwaves last year, cooling systems at major data centres failed, degrading mobile networks and disrupting vital services – all without a dramatic trigger event.

Read also: As the ITU turns 160, our interconnected world needs cooperation more than ever

These events serve as warnings. While AI challenges and cyber threats are widely analysed, knowledge about disruptions to physical digital infrastructure often remains trapped in silos.

This is why ITU and the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, together with Sciences Po, came together to ask: Are we prepared for such a digital pandemic?

The report we published on 5 May, with the support of international experts, identifies these hidden risks, examines plausible future scenarios, and explores solutions to prevent cascading disruptions. It also draws on historical facts.

In 1859, the Carrington Event, a geomagnetic storm prompted by a massive solar flare, disrupted the entire telegraph system across Europe and North America, with operators receiving electrical shocks and the Northern Lights visible at tropical latitudes. If a storm of a similar magnitude struck today, satellites could fail, power grids could collapse, and overheated transformers would prevent people from using telecom networks, the internet, and navigation systems like GPS, possibly for weeks.

As space becomes increasingly crowded, the risk of the Kessler Syndrome, a chain reaction caused by space debris, also continues to rise.

All this is compounded by another concern. We are forgetting how to function without digital systems. We no longer remember phone numbers. We carry less cash. We rely on apps for basic daily life. When the tech network fails, we don’t just lose convenience. Paying for groceries, calling the doctor, or even understanding what’s going on outside our front door could become impossible for many.

Digital failures are a disaster risk, not just a technical problem. Just as governments have plans for floods, fires and earthquakes, they should prepare for the digital collapse too. Who is responsible if networks fail? Which systems must be protected first? What happens if power, connectivity and cloud services go down at the same time?

No single country can solve that. Nor can any company. States, institutions, businesses and infrastructure managers need to coordinate proactively. Together, we must build the practical capacity to prevent, mitigate and respond to digital infrastructure shocks.  Future prosperity in every country will depend on digital resilience. Let’s come together now to protect the world’s digital lifelines.

Tomas Lamanauskas is the ITU’s deputy secretary general. He has 25 years of experience spanning telecoms and digital policy, regulation and strategy, and has held executive-level positions in agencies, companies and organisations across Europe, the Middle East, the Caribbean and the Pacific region.

Geneva Solutions publishes opinions and columns proposed by or requested from external contributors and experts. These texts reflect the point of view of their authors and do not represent the position of the media.