Alarm bells went off following reports last week that the U.S. is concerned about Russian ships operating near vital undersea cables, and that Russia could damage those cables in times of conflict or tension. At stake is the safety of the vast network of cables around the globe that carry almost all of the world’s Internet communications and financial transactions. As it happens, Russia may not have an incentive to damage those cables, since it would also suffer from any disruption in communications, according to experts at Wharton and New York University. However, the threat of cyber attacks on those cables is real, they said. Severed cables can be easily repaired, albeit with heavy costs, and the bigger risk is from unintentional, routine cable breaks. The best defense against such threats is to avoid the existing concentration of cable landings along U.S. coasts, according to the experts.…