[skolor]

Why wouldn't they just drop their equipment and leave? Cutting cables causes a noticeable outage and requires people to physically visit the point of modification, which ruins the covert potential for such equipment.

[codezero]

Possibly there's no way to install the equipment in a way that won't interrupt service.

Also, such an approach would give the fiber company plausible deniability if they were ever called out for supporting NSA data collection.

[2close4comfort]

unless you your install is downstream of the cut and action of the cable cutting is both to interrupt service and to cause a distraction...