10 Critical Bottlenecks in Modern Civilization Posing a Major Risk

We like to think modern civilization is robust, backed by endless redundancy. But under the surface, there are critical choke points—places, systems, or single providers where failure would ripple through the entire world. These are the brittle backbones of global stability, and most people have no idea how many eggs we’ve put in very few baskets.

Here are 10 startlingly fragile bottlenecks that could hold up everything from medicine to the internet.

Related: 10 Communication Networks Defying Global Censorship Efforts

10 One GPS System Guides the Entire World

The Global Positioning System (GPS), developed and maintained by the United States military, underpins everything from Google Maps to military drone strikes. Civilian and commercial systems depend on signals from about 31 active satellites orbiting Earth, all controlled from a single operations center at Schriever Space Force Base in Colorado. While Europe has Galileo, Russia has GLONASS, and China has BeiDou, GPS remains the default globally—because it was the first, it’s free to use, and almost every phone, plane, ship, and server farm is built to depend on it.

GPS isn’t just about directions. Telecom networks, financial trading systems, and power grids rely on GPS signals for precision timing. Remove GPS, and you could lose automated farming, cargo ship routing, aircraft tracking, 911 call geolocation, and ATM network syncing—within hours. GPS jammers are already sold on black markets and used in crimes to block tracking. A solar flare, cyberattack, or software bug in the wrong ground station could throw entire sectors into chaos. There is no equally reliable public backup system, and the U.S. has delayed deploying alternatives for over a decade.^[1]

9 One Plant in Denmark Makes the World’s Insulin Needles

Insulin-dependent diabetics worldwide rely on pen injectors—compact, pre-measured devices that let users self-administer precise insulin doses. Those pens aren’t usable without needle tips, which are manufactured primarily at one facility in Hillerød, Denmark, operated by Novo Nordisk, the world’s largest insulin provider. The factory produces billions of needles annually, accounting for a massive share of the global supply. These aren’t generic parts—they’re pharmaceutical-grade products requiring extremely sterile, precision manufacturing lines and regulatory compliance.

Disruptions to this factory, whether from labor shortages, fire, cyberattack, or geopolitical interference, would choke the global insulin supply chain. Alternative needle producers exist but don’t have the capacity to scale instantly, and switching manufacturing is not like flipping a switch. Qualifying new facilities takes years of investment, infrastructure, and regulatory approval. During COVID-19, a brief slowdown caused ripple shortages across Europe and forced rationing in smaller markets. This single Danish site functions as a silent lynchpin of global diabetes care, and very few health systems have contingencies if it goes offline.^[2]

8 A Single Company Controls Most of the Internet’s Domains

Verisign, a little-known U.S. tech company, holds the registry for .com and .net domains, which together account for over 150 million websites—including banks, government services, e-commerce giants, and critical infrastructure. Verisign doesn’t just sell domains; it maintains the authoritative DNS servers that allow browsers to resolve those domains into IP addresses. If those root servers go dark, your computer doesn’t just slow down — it can’t find sites at all. The entire “.com” space effectively disappears.

This choke point is especially risky because the DNS system wasn’t built with widespread redundancy. It relies on 13 root name servers globally, but Verisign controls two of the most crucial ones. Any breach, hijacking, or infrastructure failure at Verisign could ripple outward into a global web blackout. In 2016, a DDoS attack on DNS provider Dyn (not even Verisign) took down Reddit, Twitter, and Spotify for hours. A similar attack on Verisign’s core infrastructure could cut access to the internet’s backbone entirely, and there is no instant failover mechanism.^[3]

7 Most of the World’s Surgical Gloves Come from One Country

Over 300 billion disposable gloves are used each year worldwide—for surgeries, routine healthcare, food handling, labs, and personal protection. Over two-thirds of those gloves are made in Malaysia, with just a handful of companies like Top Glove, Hartalega, and Supermax dominating the global output. These factories operate massive lines running 24/7 and require highly specific raw latex, nitrile rubber, and chemical accelerators, most of which are also regionally sourced, creating multiple regional dependencies.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the global reliance on these Malaysian manufacturers became a glaring vulnerability. Outbreaks among factory workers and strict local lockdowns triggered immediate global shortages. Hospitals in Europe and North America had to reuse gloves or go without, and prices jumped by over 300%. Many glove workers also live in company dormitories—when those became virus hotspots, entire plants were shut down. Efforts to shift production elsewhere failed due to cost, speed, and quality control issues. The entire world’s healthcare system still rests on a few industrial parks outside Kuala Lumpur.^[4]

6 The World’s Most Important Software Runs on COBOL

COBOL (Common Business-Oriented Language) was created in 1959 and was never supposed to last this long. However, due to its speed, reliability, and ability to handle vast quantities of data, it became the backbone of financial systems. Today, over 220 billion lines of COBOL code are still in use—embedded in banking systems, social security databases, airline booking tools, and tax processing servers. It quietly powers mainframes at JPMorgan, Bank of America, and the IRS, among others.

The problem? Almost no one alive today is trained to maintain or upgrade it. Universities stopped teaching COBOL decades ago, and the few remaining COBOL programmers are mostly retirees. When unemployment claims surged during COVID, multiple U.S. states publicly begged for COBOL volunteers to fix crashing systems. Migrating to modern code is expensive and risky—a single error could delete decades of financial data. So, institutions keep patching legacy codes that were written before most of their staff were born. The digital economy rests on half-century-old logic written in a language almost no one speaks.^[5]

5 Two Companies Make All the World’s Epinephrine

Epinephrine is one of the most essential emergency medications on Earth. It reverses anaphylaxis, a potentially fatal allergic reaction, and is also used in asthma attacks, cardiac arrest, and septic shock. While the delivery devices like EpiPens are branded and visible, the raw active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) that makes epinephrine work is produced almost entirely by two manufacturers: Amphastar Pharmaceuticals in the U.S. and Yantai Jiashi Pharmaceutical in China. These companies make the base compound, which is then distributed globally to device manufacturers like Mylan and Teva.

In 2020, a contamination issue at one of these plants triggered a wave of shortages that spread across North America and Europe despite COVID-related stockpiling efforts. The bottleneck isn’t just about raw supply—it’s about purity, production speed, and regulatory approval. Any change in supplier requires years of trials and government sign-offs. Meanwhile, demand is growing due to increased allergy diagnoses and population density. Without a stable supply from these two sources, patients with peanut allergies or bee sting sensitivities face a real risk of death from a gap no one else is ready to fill.^[6]

4 Most of Global Trade Relied on Panama and Suez Canals

The Panama Canal and Suez Canal together handle about 18% of all global maritime trade, acting as literal shortcuts between major oceans. The Panama Canal shaves 8,000 miles off trips between the Atlantic and Pacific, while the Suez avoids the entire African continent. They are both surrounded by fragile political ecosystems and governed by narrow, outdated physical constraints. The Suez is a straight trench prone to wind and human error, while the Panama Canal relies on freshwater reservoirs drying up due to climate change.

The 2021 Ever Given incident in the Suez Canal halted over $60 billion in trade over six days. Cargo backed up for weeks, and everything from electronics to livestock suffered. The Panama Canal, meanwhile, is now routinely delaying ships due to drought, cutting the number of daily crossings by nearly half in 2023. There are no viable alternatives—rerouting around Africa or South America adds weeks and millions in fuel costs. If either canal were disabled by war, terrorism, or even a storm, the shock to global shipping, food supply, and oil markets would be instant.^[7]

3 Semiconductor Fabrication Depends on a Single Dutch Company

At the heart of every modern chip in smartphones, laptops, EVs, and cloud servers lies a 5-nanometer or smaller transistor pattern created by a process called extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV). Only one company in the world makes EUV machines: ASML, which is based in the Netherlands. Each machine costs up to $200 million, contains over 100,000 components, and takes 18 months to assemble. Without ASML, Taiwan’s TSMC, South Korea’s Samsung, and even Intel couldn’t produce next-gen chips.

In 2020, China requested access to EUV machines, but export bans blocked the deal, highlighting ASML’s geopolitical importance. If ASML were taken offline by fire, cyberattack, trade war, or internal sabotage, chip manufacturing would stall globally within weeks. New facilities like Intel’s Fab 42 in Arizona still rely on ASML shipments. Even the parts ASML uses to build the machines—including precision mirrors from ZEISS and lasers from Cymer—have no second sources. A disruption to this one company could ripple through the tech, defense, automotive, and AI industries all at once.^[8]

2 The World’s Vaccine Glass Vials Come From One Supplier

Pharmaceutical vials are not just ordinary glass containers. They must withstand high heat, cryogenic freezing, pressure changes, and long-term chemical storage—and only borosilicate glass meets all these criteria. Schott AG, a German manufacturer, produces roughly 70% of all vaccine-grade vials globally, including for Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca. Each vial has to meet microscopic tolerances and contain no reactive ions, or it can ruin an entire batch of vaccines worth millions.

During the early stages of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout, countries faced a harsh realization: even if doses were manufactured on time, they couldn’t be shipped without enough vials. Efforts to expand supply were limited by the need for specialized furnaces, raw materials like silica and boron, and qualified technicians. Vial production is not automated at scale—many steps involve skilled human labor, glassblowing techniques, and visual inspection. If Schott’s factory network—concentrated in Germany and India—faced a labor strike, earthquake, or cyber incident, the global immunization infrastructure would choke immediately.^[9]

1 The Majority of the World’s Cobalt Comes from One Place

Cobalt is essential for lithium-ion batteries, which power nearly every laptop, electric vehicle, smartphone, and renewable energy storage device. While small amounts are mined in countries like Russia, Australia, and Canada, over 70% of global cobalt supply comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Much of the DRC’s production is concentrated in just a few mega mines around Kolwezi and Lubumbashi, operated by foreign conglomerates with deeply tangled relationships with the Congolese state.

This supply chain is not just fragile—it is ethically volatile. The DRC has long struggled with political instability, armed conflict, and allegations of child labor in artisanal mines. In 2022, a U.S. congressional report found that American EV companies were sourcing cobalt indirectly from sites linked to human rights abuses. Despite this, global demand for cobalt continues to skyrocket. No substitute is ready to replace cobalt at scale, and recycling efforts lag far behind. If DRC’s exports were cut off by rebellion, embargo, or infrastructure collapse, the entire green energy transition could grind to a halt.^[10]