Internet Probably Couldn't Handle a Flu Pandemic

Several readers including mikael and gclef noted a report from the General Accountability Office suggesting that it should be Homeland Security's job to make sure the nation's business can flow during a pandemic. In particular, if H1N1 sends workers and schoolchildren home in large numbers, GAO thinks it might be a good idea for ISPs to prioritize traffic (favoring commerce over games, say), to reduce network speeds, and possibly to shut down high-traffic Web sites. DHS retorts that not only isn't it their job to control the Internet in this way, but the GAO is naive to believe it's even possible: "An expectation of unlimited Internet access during a pandemic is not realistic." "[DHS] does not even have a plan to start work on the issue, the General Accountability Office said. But the Homeland Security Department accused the GAO of having unrealistic expectations of how the Internet could be managed if millions began to telework from home at the same time as bored or sick schoolchildren were playing online, sucking up valuable bandwidth. Experts have for years pointed to the potential problem of Internet access during a severe pandemic, which would be a unique kind of emergency. It would be global, affecting many areas at once, and would last for weeks or months... Many companies and government offices hope to keep operations going as much as possible with teleworking using the Internet. Among the many problems posed by this idea, however, is the issue of bandwidth..."

Comments

OK, the solution for this is easy...

[bennomatic]

Provide tax incentives to large companies to encourage as many of their workers as possible to telecommute as often as possible. This would accomplish a number of things:

• It would alter the bandwidth landscape such that a pandemic would have a less significant sudden effect on the amount of dependency on home Internet connections.
• It would reduce vehicle traffic on the roads during peak commute hours.
• Per the previous item, it would reduce the amount of carbon emissions going into the air due to tens of thousands of cars sitting idle in traffic jams twice a day.
• Per the previous items, it would also cut down on the volume of fossil fuels burned during commute hours and may assist in reducing our dependency on foreign oil sources.
• It would reduce the volume of physical interactions between employees, reducing the likelihood of a pandemic spreading throughout an entire organization, and also reducing the flow of such a virus through society at large.

I am sure there would be negative implications as well, but I think there is a lot to be said for encouraging an environment where there are more people working from home.

Re:Anonymous Coward

[Ethanol-fueled]

I fail to see why this is any different from other emergencies that have benefited from the free flow of information concerning problems

The free flow of information in emergencies is a problem if you're a totalitarian government or, say, Iran. As of this moment it's hyperbole to apply that to the U.S., but the effective building of repressive regimes takes away liberties piecewise. H1N1 a national emergency?!

The sun of our liberty won't just fall into the ocean, it'll gradually fade away through a twilight which has already begun.