Internet 'Kill Switch' Would Give President Power to Shut Down the Web
- Thread starter Smalgov
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I think they should let me push the button :male-fighter2:
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If the people get a government kill-switch
Seriously though - this is insane. First any kind of regulation of the ISPs is blown away, and now they're trying to create this internet-master-switch that could potentially cripple all internet traffic the world over.
Seriously though - this is insane. First any kind of regulation of the ISPs is blown away, and now they're trying to create this internet-master-switch that could potentially cripple all internet traffic the world over.
I don't necessarily agree with this- what if the internet of the innocent users is shut down? I mean, it makes sense for people like hackers or online child predators, but I do agree with Kevin that no one person should have this type of power, but I guess it could be useful in some sort of emergency situation, as stated by the article. The US has much bigger issues to deal with at present than the internet.
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What could possibly happen that would require for the internet to be switched off? The only reason to switch off the internet would be to stop the spreading of information.
And try as I might, I cannot imagine a situation in which this would be legitimate.
And as I said before - considering how much of the internet is physically located in the US, this would basically shut the internet down for the whole world.
And that is just pure insanity.
Imagine if another G.W. Bush gets elected who decides that "all that evil porn must disappear" or "those terrorists don't deserve the internet" - boom, there you go. Considering such a president can go to war for nothing (Iraq), this would not be such a big leap.
And try as I might, I cannot imagine a situation in which this would be legitimate.
And as I said before - considering how much of the internet is physically located in the US, this would basically shut the internet down for the whole world.
And that is just pure insanity.
Imagine if another G.W. Bush gets elected who decides that "all that evil porn must disappear" or "those terrorists don't deserve the internet" - boom, there you go. Considering such a president can go to war for nothing (Iraq), this would not be such a big leap.
I don't think it would have much effect beyond the US. Every country has their own internet back bones and stuff. Two important sites that might go missing in such a case would be Google and Wikipedia (of course Facebook and Twitter and MySpace) but most of the sites operated from within another country would still work.
I could imagine all they'd have to do is shut down the major backbone servers and a couple thousand important hub servers to prevent a cyberwar attack on the US.
But from the technical point of view, such a cyberwar attack would be near impossible. Especially code that is targeted at effecting servers will have problems being effective when almost all servers use different versions of various operating systems, most of which aren't Windows. And the market share for Windows clients is also falling ... the highest security risks are caused by pirated copies of Windows that cannot use Microsoft's security updates (b/c WGA tests would fail).
I could imagine all they'd have to do is shut down the major backbone servers and a couple thousand important hub servers to prevent a cyberwar attack on the US.
But from the technical point of view, such a cyberwar attack would be near impossible. Especially code that is targeted at effecting servers will have problems being effective when almost all servers use different versions of various operating systems, most of which aren't Windows. And the market share for Windows clients is also falling ... the highest security risks are caused by pirated copies of Windows that cannot use Microsoft's security updates (b/c WGA tests would fail).
I wouldn't worry too much about this crippling global internet traffic. After reading this I looked at a geographic "internet map" and from the looks of things, the only countries (other than the US) that might be seriously affected by the use of such a kill switch would be Mexico and Canada (Canada in particular). It looks like a lot of their internet traffic is routed through the US rather than going directly to its destination, and while Mexico has independent connections to South and Central America, Canada doesn't appear to have many independent connections to other countries.
The US and Europe are heavily interconnected and each appears to serve as a hub of sorts for more remote countries. Fortunately there don't seem to be many places whose only means of communicating with the outside world is via the US (most connections are redundant and multiple paths are available). Most smaller networks connect to both US and European networks (Europe is depicted as such a dense blob of connections that an individual country's networks are hard to discern, although Germany appears especially well connected), as well as major hubs in Indonesia, India and Japan. Thus, even the worst case scenario wouldn't bring the global internet to a halt, but it may slow down communications, particularly for the more isolated networks. That being said, the US does hold the largest single piece of the internet, and it would put the Department of Homeland Security in a position to do about as much harm as it is possible for one agency to do (which fortunately isn't much).
Another thing to keep in mind is that the "kill switch" analogy isn't very apt, as an ISP can be ordered to do a number of things besides shutting down, such as blocking traffic from individual countries. This would mean that if this power were used as intended (and that's a big if) most of the world probably wouldn't even notice. The thing I find the most troubling about this law is that it would give the US government the ability to shut down internal communications (including telephone access) at will, which could be a powerful tool in the hands of a despot.
On another note, if they're worried about an attack on infrastructure, like the electrical grid, wouldn't it be simpler to require utility companies to keep their critical systems isolated from the internet? Some utilities like sewage treatment plants are essentially self contained and shouldn't need to communicate with outside networks in the first place. Electrical distributors do need to share data, but they already have a network of electrical transmission cables which can be made to serve double duty as data transmission lines (the practice is known as powerline networking). It shouldn't be that difficult to create their own isolated communication network which has, by virtue of being transmitted over the electrical grid itself, every connection they should need to make with another electrical company.
The US and Europe are heavily interconnected and each appears to serve as a hub of sorts for more remote countries. Fortunately there don't seem to be many places whose only means of communicating with the outside world is via the US (most connections are redundant and multiple paths are available). Most smaller networks connect to both US and European networks (Europe is depicted as such a dense blob of connections that an individual country's networks are hard to discern, although Germany appears especially well connected), as well as major hubs in Indonesia, India and Japan. Thus, even the worst case scenario wouldn't bring the global internet to a halt, but it may slow down communications, particularly for the more isolated networks. That being said, the US does hold the largest single piece of the internet, and it would put the Department of Homeland Security in a position to do about as much harm as it is possible for one agency to do (which fortunately isn't much).
Another thing to keep in mind is that the "kill switch" analogy isn't very apt, as an ISP can be ordered to do a number of things besides shutting down, such as blocking traffic from individual countries. This would mean that if this power were used as intended (and that's a big if) most of the world probably wouldn't even notice. The thing I find the most troubling about this law is that it would give the US government the ability to shut down internal communications (including telephone access) at will, which could be a powerful tool in the hands of a despot.
On another note, if they're worried about an attack on infrastructure, like the electrical grid, wouldn't it be simpler to require utility companies to keep their critical systems isolated from the internet? Some utilities like sewage treatment plants are essentially self contained and shouldn't need to communicate with outside networks in the first place. Electrical distributors do need to share data, but they already have a network of electrical transmission cables which can be made to serve double duty as data transmission lines (the practice is known as powerline networking). It shouldn't be that difficult to create their own isolated communication network which has, by virtue of being transmitted over the electrical grid itself, every connection they should need to make with another electrical company.
Great post!! (and great sig, btw! 
)
I don't know what kinds of data transmission lines exist in the US, but I can say for Germany at least that many (especially larger) companies do not send company-internal data over the Internet ... instead, they use digital subscriber lines of various types and qualities that are only for use by a particular company. I used to know a project manager who was involved in electrical grid projects, and he talked about the isolated network they were using. A close relative of mine used to work in a telecommunication department that managed those kind of lines for customers. Those lines existed long before the Internet came into widespread use, and still exist now. Many companies I've seen here in Germany keep their in-house data traffic away from the Internet, and only connect to the Internet for web serving and web access.
)I don't know what kinds of data transmission lines exist in the US, but I can say for Germany at least that many (especially larger) companies do not send company-internal data over the Internet ... instead, they use digital subscriber lines of various types and qualities that are only for use by a particular company. I used to know a project manager who was involved in electrical grid projects, and he talked about the isolated network they were using. A close relative of mine used to work in a telecommunication department that managed those kind of lines for customers. Those lines existed long before the Internet came into widespread use, and still exist now. Many companies I've seen here in Germany keep their in-house data traffic away from the Internet, and only connect to the Internet for web serving and web access.
Approved!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/25/internet-kill-switch-appr_n_625856.html
We will see if it is a bad or good thing I guess..
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/25/internet-kill-switch-appr_n_625856.html
We will see if it is a bad or good thing I guess..
Its just another step of that slippery slope of Government getting more control and eventual control of what they think is appropriate information that should get out to the people. They have no business whatsoever having the ability to shut down the internet.
