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Will the U.S. Lose Control of the Internet?
MattSparkes writes "The first UN-sponsored Internet Governance Forum (IGF) meeting is taking place next week in Athens, which aims to 'contribute to a better understanding of how the internet can be used to its full potential.' It is likely that several countries will object to the US monopoly on Internet governance, as they did at the last meeting, where the US cited fears of a loss of freedom of speech as the reason for retaining power. Other topics to be discussed include online security, access for non-English users and spam."
They blocked the .xxx domain, which is unfortunate, but it was part of a stupid concept to begin with.
Just imagine what China, Iran, etc. would do with control?
The US started the internet and everyone joined our network. So it's totally understandable if the US retains "control". The only reason I would actually be unhappy with an international commission or department taking control is that it would just mean another level of bureaucracy to cut through whenever you wanted to do something.
Mod me up, mod me down, do your worst you modding clown.
Will the U.S. lose control of the Internet? One can hope.
I don't know where this insane notion came from that the U.S. is capable of governing the Internet any better than the world community at large. In case you haven't been watching the news, we can barely govern ourselves right now.
The U.S. has a fine history of coming up with a really nifty idea and developing it to the point that it's useful, and then totally screwing it up to the point that someone else has to come in dominate the market in that particular field. Witness the auto industry. Or computer chip manufacturing. Or cell phones. Or videogames. Or more recently, programming.
Also, if I were another country, I'd be mad as hell that certain parts of my industry are completely and utterly under the control of another country. Witness what's been going on with Spamhaus. Also, check out how our own leaders react when someone like, oh I don't know, Sadam Hussein starts threatening to impact the availability of our oil resources.
So go ahead and mod me a troll or baiter of the flame if you have to, but it doesn't change that it's only a matter of time before the rest of the world stands up to the big bad U.S. and says, "Enough." And frankly, speaking as an American, even I think that that's a good thing.
Online security, access for non-English users and spam? Yeah, right. Other topics to be discussed include spying on the US, countering United Nations efforts, hacking for military secrets, laundering money, limiting access to information (such as news, especially from the West), and whitewashing history ("June 4th Incident, 1989? Never heard of it!".)
This kind of issue highlights the importance of "soft power". For those of you who have never heard the phase, it basically means the power you get from people trusting you, and from having moral authority.
As you might have guessed, it is out of favour with the current administration, who prefer military "hard power". Previously, the USA could have said to the rest of the world "trust us to manage the Internet" and much of the world would have gone "ummm, ok!". Now the USA has lost much of its soft power, it makes it much harder, and "hard power" doesn't work well in this kind of situation!
If the U.S. keeps control, eventually the corporatocracy will kill off everything.
What are you referring to, exactly?
What have 'they' done thus far to impede the internet?
Last time I checked, I can still download illegal files, go to any website on the web, and e-mail anybody in the world.
Sure, some things may end up with me in the FBI's hot-seat, but that has nothing to do with corporations.
It is likely that several countries will object to the US monopoly on Internet governance
WHAT governance? The sections of the network owned by people or businesses in the US are governed by THEIR OWNERS. Germany can outlaw swastika's and regulate their own country's infastructure, and the US can regulate theirs. That's what made the internet the powerhouse it is today--give people incentive to build infastructure by giving them control over it.
THE ONLY reason to give power to others is so they can assert control over US-OWNED NETWORKS. If they're pissed because some companies ban foreign traffic, tough bananas. Go ahead and ban US citizenry from using your network, if you think you can take the financial hit.
Nice try, UN.
When the US economic power slows, and the EU (or whatever group) has more power, maybe then will the tables turn and it will be the US complaining about lack of power online. Until then, deal with it.
Latewire
The UN which allows human rights abuses of the highest order to be involved in its human rights commission or the US which at least still has the 1st amendment and other rights on paper? Here's a thought for non-Americans who care about freedom of speech. You are probably a real minority. You want more, not less, American governance of the internet. The ideal solution for you would be total governance of the Internet by American jurisprudence. We have significantly higher standards for free speech rights than the rest of the world and when a foreigner comes to America, they even have officially all of the rights of a citizen WRT the courts. And those of you who want to bring up the MCA or other Bushisms, STFU. That has no relevance here. No court in America is going to allow Bush to hold you as an enemy combatant for suing him over Internet policy.
My government sucks. I'll be the first to say that about the US government, but it sucks a lot less than the EU, China or the UN.
access for non-English
Read: Requirements for language translations on web-sites.
online security
Lets have people register to run a web-site! That way we can track things better and "protect" children! And no more defending the Nazis if you want to after the French and Germans get into this.
spam
No more sending email unless it's through state-approved servers.
Yeah, this is gonna be great... We're from the government, and we're here to help!
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
the freedom of speech will gain a lot.
Considering that it is the middle eastern and Chinese governments that are pushing hardest for this I would say that this is exactly opposite to what will actually occur.
I can envision the comments already. Rednecks spouting their crap while moronic hippies spew their BS, both of them thinking they're somehow "right". .com as a first choice and everything else as sub-standard.
You know what, if a country wants to do as they please with their part of the internet, all they have to do is update a couple of DNS servers. As simple as that. In fact, I'm already looking into using an alternative DNS root.
NO debating is needed. NO decision needs to be taken. All those who want a non-USA-regulated net have to do is START using the internet the way they like, simply disregarding USA rules. And, well, be ready to be cut off from any USA network, if the USA were so inclined. What's that you say, your citizens won't like it? Tough luck buddy, that's the price of freedom. It goes both ways.
On a side note, maybe it's time we did away with non-national TLDs. But that can only be done when people stop treating
Global warming is a cube.
I for one hope the US and its Ministry of Truth keeps control. I'd hate to see obsolete information or the lies of the enemies propogated throughout the news sites I frequent. /sarcasm
At any rate, the Internet in its current form is the place with the freest speech in all the world.
Mod me up, mod me down, do your worst you modding clown.
the US doesn't *own* the "internet", we are just using mirrors of their DNS servers and we can very well stop doing so in a day or two.
As corrupt and stupid as US politicians are, they're bush-league amateurs compared to UN diplomats. The UN is the single most corrupt organization on the planet, and I have no intention of ever letting them have control of anything without putting up the most resistance that I possibly can. I have no love for US politics, but I detest world politics. Can you imagine the security council having say over censorship on the internet?
Access for non-English actually means something entirely different from what you think. Right now DNS names are restricted to ASCII characters. If you live in China, Japan, Russia, or any of a number of other places, you can't use your own alphabet to get to a website. Even if the entire site is in your native language, you still have to use English to get there.
/.???
There's something called IDN (Internationalized Domain Names) that is an effort to change that by allowing DNS to use Unicode characters. That way you could have native language DNS names.
How would you like it if you had to type in something in Chinese to get to
CitrusTV (http://www.citrustv.net): the Nation's Oldest & Largest Entirely Student-Run Television Station
U.N. fair? Oh you're funny...really...if you were serious, this wouldn't be funny but thank goodness you're not.
The UN, if given control, will probably have an Internet governing council. This council, aside from running the technical aspects of the Internet with the UN's usual bureaucratic incompetence, will be comprised of a rotating set of members. It is these members that will be responsible for policies, such as freedom of speech.
The UN Commission on Human Rights counted among its members Cuba, China and Saudi Arabia. After much criticism over the membership of such countries where mass violation of human rights is policy, it was replaced with the Human Rights Council, which includes in its membership -- you guessed it -- Cuba, China and Saudi Arabia.
The UN apparently believes in using the fox to guard the hen house. Does anybody really want Cuba and China to have a say in our freedom of speech?
THE ONLY reason to give power to others is so they can assert control over US-OWNED NETWORKS
Maybe, but right now the US is asserting control over everyone else's networks.
Here's a real-life example for you: I was sued in a US court for a part of my website. I am a German. I've been to the US once, 15 years ago. I've never been to that particular state. The website is hosted on a server that has never been outside Germany (except probably to be assembled in China). The domain is registered to me, on a german address. The registrar is german, as is the ISP. Until that day, I knew nobody in California.
Jurisdiction wasn't even checked. I learned that it was my job to challenge it - by paying a US lawyer to appear in a US court to tell them "erm, did you notice that Germany happens to not be a county of California?".
No. Wake up, fool! This is not about anyone else wanting to control US networks, it's about getting the fucking US out of our networks. If you morons were to accept that there is an Internet outside the US, we wouldn't want to desperately get you to give up control.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
You forgot Wal-Mart
"If your parents never had children, chances are you wonât either." -Dick Cavett
Well in response to to someone's post about what makes the US more capable than another country to be "in charge" of the internet, my response would be "experience and ownership."
Exactly what is the problem that needs to be solved here? Maybe I should expand the number of sites I visit on a daily basis, but I don't think I've ever been blocked from visiting anything that I wanted to look at. Hell, I don't think I've ever even been blocked from things I DIDN'T want to look at. I fail to see why the current management needs to be ousted or even given this much bullshit in it's general course of business.
I'd like to know where this would lead? I'm assuming that it's really the commercial aspect of the internet they are after control over. Perhaps a UN mandated internet tax of some sort, or even better, an online commerce tax mandated by the UN. Certainly we can't say that the Academic aspects of the internet are wholly owned by the US Government, as it's (unless i'm mistaken) pretty much a multi-naitonal group of researcheres and universities sharing information, who could just go ahead and build their own network anyways.
At best, this is just another attempt by a useless neutered organization to grab at power (and money/tax revenue) it dosn't have. At worst, it's a consortium of poorer and/or angry countries picking on the US for all that we have. It kinda makes me think of those arguments where people say "The United States has xx% of the resources but only has x% of the population," and then proceed to ramble about how it's not fair, and we owe it to the world to be their resource providers for free.
Get real. Build your own network or shut up and be thankful we let you be a part of ours.
if you think "international" control of the internet won't quickly lead to balkanization and the loss of freedom of speech and information.
I am an internationalist on many issues, but not this one. Not yet, not when so many governments have proven to abuse censorship power whenever it's given to them.
+++ATH0
Here's a real-life example for you: I was sued in a US court for a part of my website.
How is that relevant? If the UN controlled the Internet (whatever that means), some tool in Cali can still sue you. As it is, just write to the judge or call them up and explain matters. If you haven't been there in 15 years, what's a judgement going to accomplish?
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Russia, and other similarly "free" regimes... Be careful, what you wish for, Illiberals.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
THE ONLY reason to give power to others is so they can assert control over US-OWNED NETWORKS. If they're pissed because some companies ban foreign traffic, tough bananas. Go ahead and ban US citizenry from using your network, if you think you can take the financial hit.
Nice try, UN.
Hell yeah! That UN shold stop staring blindly at their narrow 'world view' and take a step back to look at the wider US picture! These 'United Nations' that try to wrest away control over every American's Internet from the Leader of the Free World can just go ahead and try!
Seriously, wtf? The Internet is global and currently the US controls ICANN. Believe it or not, roughly 180 countries see this as a problem. It's not as if the UN is going to hand sole control over to China.
The situation you pointed out is a problem, but it has nothing to do with "who controls the Internet." It's a legal issue, one of many examples where the laws have not really caught up to the times. Let me slightly modify your example to show you how complicated it can get: Let's say Bob lives in Germany. His server is located in... oh, I don't know, the UK. Jill lives in the US.
Jill thinks Bob has (for example) libeled her on his website. Where was the crime committed? IE, which court is going to have jurisdiction? Germany, where Bob lives? The UK, where the material in question resides and where one could argue Bob "went" to transfer his material to the website? The US, where the person who is claiming a tort resides?
Imagine instead of the server being in the UK, it's in some country with extremely lax laws or even no laws at all regarding things like this. A free pass to do absolutely anything they want? Your example might not be fair, but neither is that.
The two most logical, workable choices would be either Germany or the US. In the US, we believe that our citizens should be able to petition the courts. The obvious problem with US jurisdiction in the case is that they are basically powerless to enforce their decision, unless Germany decides to help. German jurisdiction also makes sense, but it really is little better; it simply shifts the potentially heavy burden of the suit from Bob to Jill.
It has nothing to do with malice. Nothing to do with controlling the Internet. It's a simple case of different places having different laws, and nobody really knowing what to make of this new-fangled Internet-majig. I'm sure numerous /.ers will pour in with their immense legal wisdom (and of course a IANAL disclaimer), but contrary to their opinions, these really are not simple problems with simple solutions. These are issues of international politics and international law. If you think it's hard to get good decisions made within a country, boy, try lining 100 different countries up and asking them to agree on something.
And you never told us what happened with your case. Did you hire a lawyer and was the case dismissed afterward? Because if it was, it seems to me that the process worked alright.
The thing is, the US doesn't really have a monopoly on the Internet. If any country didn't like what the US was doing with it, they could ignore it. This is because the only thing the US has control over is the DNS system. And considering the hierarchical layout of the DNS system, it'd be relatively easy for any country to change the DNS systems they own. The biggest reason people have given for the US to control the root DNS servers is that the US is the country least likely to force the governing organization (Which is not part of the US gov't) to change something.
But let's say the US does force ICANN to change something. If another country doesn't like it, they can either put up with it, or implement their own root DNS servers and force their ISPs to switch. The other arguement for US control is that the UN is too corrupt to be allowed to handle the DNS system. But let's say that all countries in the UN (Except the US, obviously) agree to take control from the US. The US can still run their own DNS servers, it's just that no one else will be using them. The thing is, there doesn't need to be a UN resolution passed to do this. Any country can just stop using those servers right now. I think that this is why most people say to leave it as it is.
(\(\
(=_=) Bani!
(")")
A company in California can sue anybody for any reason no matter who is in control of domain names on the internet. Of course, you have the right to countersue (and/or in California, receive SLAPP compensation) for such a frivolous lawsuit.
.coms are handed out has next to nothing to do with anything about who sues you for content on your website.
Who gets to control how
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Fortunately, the solution is relatively straightforward. The fact is that the US government paid for the infrastructure that supports the existing DNS. If anyone else doesn't like it, they can pay to build their own infrastructure. Yes, that'll cause some problems, but on the other hand, you'll be free from US government interference. That's a trade-off some countries might be willing to make: like you, I'm surprised that China hasn't done it already.
This subject is the cue for a feast of nationalistic dick-swinging every time it comes up, so let's just accept that:
Whoever modded parent up, please get a clue.
I actually had a long phone conversation with a judge in California. Here's the short version of the jurisdiction insanity:
* Showing up in court, sending a letter to the court, making any statement on the case whatsoever is automatically interpreted as you accepting the court's jurisdiction
* Not showing up yields you a default judgement
* There is only one way out of this dilemma: A "special appearance to challenge personal jurisdiction" - but that a) still requires you to hire a lawyer halfway around the globe and b) is a bit tricky because if it isn't executed flawlessly can easily cross into the first bullet point, and if it fails you're back at the second point.
In short: One way or the other, if you're sued in the US, you are fucked and your only hope is that your country won't enforce the judgement. Which I wouldn't count on - most western countries have treaties about these kinds of things. I was actually served the court papers (the whole 2000 or so pages of them) by a clerk at the townhall. He was kind and helpful and explained a few things about how this works, and that he is bound by law to serve me those court papers as if they were from a local court.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
As per evidence no I don't have any concrete evidence. Just a lot of anecdoteal evidence in the observations from European friends who all remark how often Americans move around compared to Europeans. This is not hard to understand considering various nations in Europe were at war with each other only 50 years ago whereas the US only had a civil war over a century and a half ago...
As to the whole people from other states having an impact on the laws in your state....well they do. Always have and always will. In the US a person's identity as an American is stronger then their identity of their state (except for folks from Texas...seriously they still think they have a legal right to scede from the Union because of their unique circumstances coming into the Union..). In Europe people consider themselves to be much more British or French or German than European, at least the older generations. So what does this mean? Well it means that when it comes time to voting in federal laws most Americans take into account that they don't really want a part of their country falling TOO far behind the rest. And there is still quite a bit of leeway by the way. The aforementioned list of southern states that I listed run quite lose with effective government and taxation. They take in very little tax revenue and let their states rot to shit as much as they can within Federal law. And thats fine. But there's a limit and the rest of the country has decided that they just don't want it to go much farther than that. Another example is California's medical weed law. The state of Cali may have approved it but the rest of the country (i.e. the feds) said no way. So its still illegal in Cali even though Cali voters don't want it to be illegal. Same for the assisted suicide law in I think Oregon or WA state. I could go on and on. There wouldn't be much of a country if any one state (or small group of states) was allowed to become TOO different from the other 49 states. You either have a cohesive nation or you don't. Seeing as how there's a lack of rioting in the streets over the issue I can only infer that most Americans are just fine with having a cohesive and strong America instead of fiercly independent nearly fully autonomous individual states.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
So my entire original point was that if I buy whisky, legally, in Colorado, while it is illegal to buy it in Utah, it is unreasonable for the original poster to conclude I am a criminal picking an opportune State in which to commit my dastardly crime.
You seem to think that because the current balance of federal vs. state power is what it is, that's what it should be; or that the current balance is desirable because of your opinion of how cohesive a nation we are or how much we identify with the nation vs. state or something. None of this is very interesting to me.
In relation to states rights the interesting question to me is, when federal authorities overide states, is it legal according to the constitution? In the Oregon Assisted suicide, or California Medical Pot examples you cite, I would argue it clearly is not. (Please don't tell the Supreme Court disagrees with me; I know that) I would specifically reject your equation of cohesion with strength; enforced uniformity means a lack of competition, stagnation, and weakness.
I don't even really understand what you're saying about the South except that you appear to think it sucks and don't want to live there, so at least we agree on something.
"Seeing as how there's a lack of rioting in the streets over the issue I can only infer that most Americans are just fine with having a cohesive and strong America instead of fiercly independent nearly fully autonomous individual states."
Seeing as their is a lack of rioting in the streets, I can only infer that most Americans have food, shelter and tellivision. I don't think their opinion of maximally localized governance and a strict constructionist aproach to federal power as a firewall against pointless infringements on civil liberties has much to do with it, as I don't think they've given it enough thought to even have such an opinion.