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Internet Kill Switch Back On the US Legislative Agenda
suraj.sun points out a story at Wired that US lawmakers have revived the idea of a government-controlled "Internet Kill Switch," which reads, in part: "The bill, which has bipartisan support, is being floated by Sen. Susan Collins, the Republican ranking member on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. The proposed legislation, which Collins said would not give the president the same power Egypt's Hosni Mubarak is exercising to quell dissent, sailed through the Homeland Security Committee in December but expired with the new Congress weeks later. 'My legislation would provide a mechanism for the government to work with the private sector in the event of a true cyber emergency,' Collins said in an e-mail Friday. 'It would give our nation the best tools available to swiftly respond to a significant threat.'"
You cannot hurt anyone with data. There is no such thing as a threat via the internet.
So when China takes over our internet, they can't use our machines to gold farm in World of Warcraft! Sarcasm aside, what would the BENEFIT of such a thing be? All it seems to be good for is pretending we don't have a Bill of Rights, specifically the first amendment.
There is no -1 Disagree.
And I almost expected this Congress to be a little different. Oh well.
Seems to me, the biggest threat would be doing EXACTLY what Mubarak is doing now in Egypt.
I can't think of any online emergency that can not be fixed by ISP's :)
C'mon. What kind of serious "cyber emergency" can metal boxes called computers pose to us humans? Having a kill switch for the web makes as little sense as having a kill switch for newspapers or TV.
Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
they got used to roundspeak and bullshit because you let them for all these years.
now all that passing an enemy-of-public bill requires is enough roundspeak, and sufficient number of catchphrases. (jobs, security, emergency, terrorism, nation, economy)
our democracies are shams.
Read radical news here
Right?
RIGHT?
Falling profits in Hollywood! Loss of iron control over media messages!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRmxXp62O8g&feature=fvst
I can't see any reasonable purpose for a government being able to shut down internet access in broad swathes; any internet "emergency" could (and would) realistically be handled quite well by the array of network providers involved in standing up the internet. Otherwise botnets would have killed us all long ago.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
than used for the intended purpose IMHO.
Many of the expanded government powers that have been sought (or implemented) in the last decade would be more acceptable with oversight directly by elected officials. As it stands now, most of the related decisions are made in secret... and that can't be good in the long run.
Seems to me, the biggest threat would be doing EXACTLY what Mubarak is doing now in Egypt.
Seriously - could the timing of this be any more ironic? The US is copying from Mubarak's playbook, now?
P.S.
It's also unconstitutional. I can not lay my hand on any power given to the Union Congress which allows them to shutdown the mail or the newspapers (old-fashioned type or modern websites/email). That power is reserved to the Member States.
If they think Congress should have that power, let the states pass an amendment FIRST granting that power, rather than create an Egypt-type problem where some future Caesar/dictator can squash the people with a simple flip of the switch.
Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
After all, who knows better how they've screwed us than the ones doing it?
Why guess when you can know? Measure!
a kill switch for newspapers or TV.
Or as much sense...
I'm sure they'd love to have it.
And what is good, Phaedrus, And what is not good... Need we ask anyone to tell us these things?
We(tech types) have to think about how to have an marginally working internet without the cooperation of the telcos. Off the top of my head I could see an entire city's wireless routers all sort of passing things along. The traceroute would be from hell but data would keep moving.
I suspect that this is being developed right now by civil minded Egyptian programmers and engineers.
It could also be used in disasters and whatnot.
As long as a node here and there could contact the rest of the internet then various governments would lose the power presently exercised to evil ends in Egypt.
Message me if anyone is serious about this and maybe something could be brewed up.
Normally I am logged in as EmperorOfCanada but not at my computer right now.
Because we'll only use it for your own good.
They're the bad guys. You can trust us.
We're looking out for you.
We(tech types) have to think about how to have an marginally working internet without the cooperation of the telcos. Off the top of my head I could see an entire city's wireless routers all sort of passing things along. The traceroute would be from hell but data would keep moving.
I suspect that this is being developed right now by civil minded Egyptian programmers and engineers.
It could also be used in disasters and whatnot.
As long as a node here and there could contact the rest of the internet then various governments would lose the power presently exercised to evil ends in Egypt.
Message me if anyone is serious about this and maybe something could be brewed up.
PS I finally remembered my password.
If this kill switch were ever to be thrown, I would give America ten days before a horde of Facebook starved teenage girls takes the White House.
who oppose net neutrality as "government intervention" on the internet? Just sayin...
"It's for your own good". Whenever a government uses those words you can assume with some confidence it's for their good and not yours.
In light of the recent incident in Egypt, it seems that the real purpose of such a kill switch is more useful as a means of censorship (a la big scandals that could make the US look bad, like Wikileaks). On a local scale, if I know my network is about to be attacked, I would cut off the main entrance into my network, while leaving the inside up and running. If they insist on a kill switch, why not just implement a similar scheme for all the "gateways" into government networks? As for each citizen's own access, I don't need the government to unplug my computer for me -- I can do that by myself, and am capable of making the decision to do so myself.
If they were to pull the plug on the internet for whatever reason... I pity the government in charge.
Could you imagine the millions of outraged facebook users looting any burning. Add that to the online gamers...
Can you say governmental genocide?
Every time I pay attention to American politics, I find myself thinking that Lee Harvey Oswald had the right idea.
I write sci-fi for metalheads
Tunisia, Egypt and Yemen have revealed the gaping hole in National Security Interests... it's US! People still have the power to reject their government when they act en masse and with the benefit of unimpeded communication. If congress succeeds in creating such a kill switch, it might as well state that the intent is to protect itself from that which all legitimate power is derived, the people.
Suddenly I'm all aquiver with my new found power...
Napoleon labeled England as a "nation full of shopkeepers." The Brits were so ticked off at that comment, that they proceeded to shove a weed up his ass at Waterloo. Now, if something really bad was to happen to the US, they would need to get them young folks away from their internet porn activities, and onto the front lines. So, shutting down the internet with the kill switch seems to be the right thing to do.
Semi-patriotic-kid: "Hey, someone cut off my Internet porn! I am now motivated to join the armed services, and kill some foreigners, who are obviously responsible for ruining my five knuckle shuffle."
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
It's FUBAR.
"An example, the aide said, would require infrastructure connected to “the system that controls the floodgates to the Hoover dam” to cut its connection to the net if the government detected an imminent cyber attack."
Am I the only one who wonders what that kind of system is doing connected to the internet in the first place? Seems to me that if you want to protect infrastructure, the easiest and most sensible thing to do would be to unplug the ethernet cable.
The significant threat is you of course....
There was just a story on Fark about how Al Jazeera was doing most of the coverage regarding Egypt. They're not even aware it's happening, they're too busy trying to hold onto their lower middle class existence.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Our government is the best one to decide what is good for us, especially for technology issues, since they have done such a great job so far!
Look at how safe we are now. Thinkof how safe we will be.
Sen. Susan Collins is an expert in this area and knows what she is doing so we should support her. She is a Phi Beta Kappa, so she's smarter than us.
O Magazine named Senator Collins one of six women who could run for President, so we should support her Internet plan.
We can trust her.
Honest!
What could possibly go wrong?
No, really. It's safe.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
I'm right across the border, I'll throw you a cable(3 ports left on my switch!)
As a Mainer, I offer you all my apologies on behalf of our senator. Snowe will almost certainly be in lock step with Collins. Feel free to vote us out of the country.
The timing is perfect if we want the bill defeated. Surely Congress will show some intelligence this time. Of course, based on their previous boondoggles, I'm not very optimistic. You know how power hungry they can be.
Oh, this was actually discussed last year, but it is just now being introduced. Don't any of you watch the news?
I guess they saw what was going on in Egypt and felt jealous.
It's also unconstitutional. I can not lay my hand on any power given to the Union Congress which allows them to shutdown the mail or the newspapers
Yeah, but those are mostly owned by the same corporations that own Congress, so they're easy enough to keep on message. But the internet still lets those scary citizens have their voices heard.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Would this trigger the need to migrate to IPv6 ASAP???!! Or what other alternatives out there you can share so the rest of us will be spared by this monstrosity?
Susan Collins is considered a "moderate", rather then wanting to expand government when her party is in power, she's always in favor of it.
Hi Commodore6502! Sadly it IS constitutional, hell just about anything the feds want to do is allowed now thanks to the way they've perverted the Commerce Clause. Thanks to the Commerce Clause they can bust pot growers in California even after the people of that state legalized medicinal pot, or even stop a farmer from growing wheat to feed his chickens
So saying anything passed by the feds is unconstitutional is nearly impossible, since they can fit anything into their realm of control under the commerce clause.. And since the ISPs cross state lines it will be an easy sell to the courts.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
"An example, the aide said, would require infrastructure connected to “the system that controls the floodgates to the Hoover dam” to cut its connection to the net if the government detected an imminent cyber attack."
Am I the only one who wonders what that kind of system is doing connected to the internet in the first place? Seems to me that if you want to protect infrastructure, the easiest and most sensible thing to do would be to unplug the ethernet cable.
Also, how are they going to know that the attack is imminent? Like, before they hear the rushing water?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
... they can just create a closed, non-internet connected network (please dont say it will be costly, its the government). They would not need to bring the ENTIRE Internet down in the country.
This is all about censorship.
--- Illogical Spock
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2565480/Funny/algore_stfu.jpg
I suspect the USA version of the internet kill switch would be more akin to turning on a nanny filter ... ISPs blocking sites / throttling traffic / packet filtering.
Plus, many websites would limit functionality...
Most likely, Google, Bing, and other major search engines would return highly censored results - they have the tools in place to do so, as well as the expertise, since already do heavy filtering in many countries.
And Facebook and other social network sites would, likewise, also strictly filter (again, the functionality in their systems is already there), as well use some psychology... ie. running a joint promotion with Zynga to require more frequent harvesting of crops in Farmville, maybe even chances to win cash - anything to keep people occupied so as to avoid reality; "bread and circuses".
Ron
Amazing how good they are at cooperating with each other when the subject at hand is a double-edged sword....one that can be used either in defense of the nation, or in the manipulation, isolation, or monitoring of the American people.
So we won the Cold War, or...did the enemy just immigrate?
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
... respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press;
The internet its the backbone of the new press, and the new place of public assembly where we meet to discuss ideas and give opinions.
Safe the individual systems that need safing. But keep federal/presidential mits off of the free exchange of speech and press. The Supreme Court should tab any kill switch as unconstitutional in my opinion. And frankly with all the hubbub about reading the constitution on the floor of the house, and the requirement for a constitutional rational included in every proposed piece of legislation, it seems like Mr. Liberman and Ms. Collins shouldhave some explaining to do even if it was introduced before the tea-party fluff. You'd think someone would consider discussing it's constitutionality.
Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.--Mark Twain
No, Collins said it wouldn't be used like that. You can trust the government. If they say they want additional power, that they won't abuse, you can always rely on government to be true to its word, right?
Totally agree with the parent. Seems like a trojan horse of an example. Looks reasonable, but bares little resemblance to what could crawl out of it after hours.
Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.--Mark Twain
You are right to wonder. I was just hoping that this aide was talking out of his ass, and this is the first thing that he thought of. One seriously hopes that these things have an air gap protecting them, but the "need" for this bill (Taking it at face value, for the sake of this point) seems to indicate otherwise.
And what is good, Phaedrus, And what is not good... Need we ask anyone to tell us these things?
"[...] would not give the president the same power Egypt's Hosni Mubarak is exercising to quell dissent"
Of course it would not give the president that kind of power. We're a Democracy and we uphold Human Rights all the time. We have a perfect track record of that according to Amnesty International. So such a switch would not give our government the power to oppress the population like the Egyptian government does, simply because our government is good and looks after our well-being.
What a shame that Mrs. Collins had to clarify this for the traitors who think our politicians can't be trusted.
But what does Charlie Sheen think of this?
What is Charlie Sheen doing now?
What would Charlie Sheen be doing if the net went down in the U.S.?
WHAT WOULD CHARLIE SHEEN DO?
is why we need real time reconfiguring p2p mesh wifi networks NOW. We should nip this in the bud with technological prowess. Anybody with a cell phone, router, or laptop that has wifi should be able to carry internet service to and from any other two wifi points. Eliminate the ISPs. Eliminate the hardware infrastructure. Eliminate the possibility for government control.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
We should start developing contingency plans to thwart a potential internet blackout.
International dial-up, data feeds over the airways, carrier pigeon...whatever.
Why are they asking for this if they don't have some kind of plan in store. Terrorism 2.0 perhaps, as the fear of conventional terrorism has faded quite a bit since 2001.
^^vv<><>BA
Actually if you read TFA you will see it was introduced last year, and sailed though its first committee.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
...that bans the use of the word "cyber" once and for all? Enough of this cyber-insanity already! I'm so cyber-sick of hearing this cyber-goddamn cyber-word! Oh, that's right, there'll never be a sane law like that. One only has to look at "Congress" to see that something like that would never occur.
- Anonymous (cyber) Coward
Not to disagree with you - a kill switch is a stupid idea - but I can think of at least two scenarios where those little metal boxes can directly affect people:
Payroll for a company is handled by some contractor on one end of the country, but the company itself has to send its data to that payroll agency, and they're on the other end of the country, so they use the public Internet (and some really good security protocol, one would assume) to route that data. If the two computers at either side of the country can't make their data exchange on time because some bird brain decided to attack either of the two, or any of the computers in between on the network, or because someone decided to throw this proposed "kill switch", then a few thousand soccer moms/dads don't get paid for a while.
If that's not good enough, consider the use of the Internet in coordinating relief efforts in far-off disaster areas or simply general humanitarian activities around the globe. Much of that help seems to come from American citizens; kill the Internet for a significant amount of time, and you kill off their ability to organize, move money around to help their cause, etc., and a lot of people who were to receive that help will suffer.
The above two scenarios are examples of the reality of the world right now; we depend on the Internet too much to just shut it off in the face of some perceived "cyberattack" (G*d do people still honestly use that prefix?), so it isn't just a matter of "what sense would it make?", it's more like "are they crazy?!".
Why do they re-elect her? The Tea Parters are opposed to all of this nonsense.
Can my karma get any worse than bad? Let's find out!
This is so sad and true. In reality it IS unconstitutional. This is exactly what the framers wanted to prevent. If they knew that the commerce clause would be twisted so badly, they would have modified it a bit, I think.
Everything is online so we can have a real-life reenactment of Live Free or Die Hard.
"Our webs are down, sir. We can't log in!"
"Which webs?"
"ALL OF THEM. They've penetrated our code walls. They're stealing the Internet!"
*brain exits stage right*
But in all seriousness, there should've been like...two Internets. You have our current Internet that anyone can use, and then you have a closed system (is intranet the term I want to use?) that only government stuff uses. So, in the event that, say, the entire Internet we use is compromised, Hoover Dam and the like are perfectly safe and sound, free from attack.
I wonder. Why is it that when I think of "Internet can control Hoover Dam/whatever," I remember that episode of The Simpsons where Homer gets on disability for being obese and operates whatever safety protocols from the comfort of his home?
If you want a internet for emergency situations you make legislation that forces a first page in cases of emergency's you don't close off the whole internet. There really is no way to justify complete control of information other than forcing a certain view of the world on the people. And if the government wants to protect their own network make it so there is a kill-switch for closing of any government website for the outside not every site for everybody.
Americans are getting progressively more out to lunch with every passing month. I have a much better idea that would work for the rest of the world - let's put a "kill switch" on the U.S. Government. Unfortunately, it would be so well-used (within the first 24 hours), that a new engineering discipline would have to be invented to come up with a material with which one could build the switch.
Take all critical infrastructure offline. vs Create a mechanism by which all critical infrastructure can be taken offline when intelligence agencies think its in danger.
Your plan is certainly safer, though probably a pain in the ass in the same way pretty much any computer not connected to the internet is a pain in the ass.
Morpheus, God of Dreams.
We should have these networks up and active, separate from the public Internet for city-by-city communication, cooperation in neighborhood security efforts, public meetings apart from open or closed government meetings where citizens may or may not be taken seriously.
Why on earth would the government need a "kill switch" when the large corporations will bend over backwards to do what the government wants already. As shown by Amazon, Visa, Mastercard, Vodaphone, Google with respect to Wikileaks, Egypt, and China respectively.
Three Squirrels
If these riots spread to additional regions, look for a 'man of peace' to step up and provide an amazing solution to the mess, and read your Bible. Weird events and disasters the world over, it could be time for the anti-christ to arise.
Accept Jesus before it's too late!
No, someone asks the same thing on every story like this.
One of the responses I remember was a pair of questions from some kind of consultant or something:
So, the system isn't actually air-gapped. And not really that secure, then, either.
Its about keeping you safe from the evildoers. Honest. Would we lie to you? We are the land of the free. WE have nothing to hide.
Yeah right. Cutting off people's internet would be far more inconvenient to the citizenry than isolated attacks on public infrastructure or government facilities.
It will effectively make them deaf, dumb, blind and mute as far as their voice in the international community goes.
Now, why would the want to do that? Maybe Assange has an idea.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
Amazing how the really bad shit always has bi-partisan support. More and more it becomes obvious that we really need a viable third party.
Quick question: Just what -exactly- is a "true cyber emergency"?
Is it to isolate our network(s) from the rest of the world?
Is it to secure our important services?
Is it to keep key infrastructure operational?
What sort of 'true cyber emergency' would want to cut us off from the rest of the world? Help me out here.
I can certainly understand wanting to keep key services from being threatened...but, shouldn't those simply be secure anway? Shouldn't they be on their own secure network anyway?
Awk! Pieces of eight. Pieces of eight. Pieces of seven... ERROR: General Protection Fault. [Paroty Error.]
This is incredibly fucking retarded. Why would you need an "Internet Kill Switch"? What "Cyber Threat" could be so bad that it would be necessary? How did they sell this to what I'm hoping is a reasonably intelligent woman? Did they fill her head with images of a jihadist cracker loosing nuclear missiles on America? Or perhaps a disgruntled teen in a bedroom in Lille typing cryptic commands into a terminal and polluting the water supply with effluents, nuclear waste and barber-shop hair-sweepings?
The only possible reason for wanting to turn off the internet is if you think it's being used for command & control of real-life terrorist cells during attacks. Which it won't be. There's no valid reason to do this.
The real motivating factor behind doing this will be Wikileaks. After that episode, the US gov will want some sure fire way to prevent embarassing truths leaking out again.
All the slimy rehtoric is just to convince the sheeple that they're not really trampling on the constitution and that the end of free speech is somehow a good thing.
I personally that any country that will turn off communications is a dictatorship. No matter what side of the aisle one falls on, I cannot believe that anyone thinks it is a good idea to give that amount of power to the government. I cannot think of one good or positive reason for this. I only see nefarious people shutting it down to disrupt the dissemination of information that said people wish to keep under wraps. Anyone who wants that scares me. It scares me that it is even being asked for.
"It seems that we are at the age where life stops giving us things, and starts taking them away..." Indiana Jones
Its probably NOT. But letting logic and reason come into the discussion won't really support the new government censorship button. That we'll only use to PROTECT YOU from the bad guys. RIght?
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
It is the people that truly need a "kill switch" with respect to abusive governments and corporations...
Based on the willingness of american ISP's to do anything the gov asks (ie warrantless illegal wiretaps), I don't see the need for this. As far as I can see, the only reason for this law is for the following situation: Prez: Gee, them wikileaks guys sure pissed me off. We should shut them down. legal advisor: Yes, but it's probably legal. And in a foreign country. Prez: Well can't you send some boys over with wirecutters and shut them down? legal advisor: not without some sort of draconian neo-nazi style law. Prez: I said, why don't you boys do something about them terrists! congress critter: You just leave it to me mister president, I know just the thing.
Don't pacemakers have net connections nowadays. I thought pacemakers uploaded the data through the net to the doctors. All this talk of the Internet not being capable of physically hurting people is nonsense. I'm not saying this legislation is good, I'm just saying people can be hurt via the net. Who is at fault, it's the fault of companies building their product in the worst way possible. The right legislation is to hold those responsible as criminals who make products that affect human life in the real world via the net that endanger human life.
My Web Site
If somebody would not consider seriously to kill somebody by something, somewhere, anytime
yes. because we do not have free speech in the united states, that is a valid concern.
Here's to finally giving Bush his exit strategy in November
In case of emergency, it would let us cut off all government computers and communication. Seems fair to me.
The timing is perfect if we want the bill defeated.
Then it's also a good thing the bill wasn't introduced right after a Terminator movie came out.
le Net Fatale
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
I agree. Making dumb decisions like these makes it harder to stop a future Mubarak type person, who heaven for bid, happens to make President of the US. Don't think it would never be possible to have a rogue president just because we haven't had one yet.
By far, the most common use of the internet is speech protected by the first amendment. The commerce clause does not override the first amendment.
...not that the first amendment will stop congress from passing the law, the President from invoking it, or the courts from arguing over the terms strict scrutiny, intermediate scrutiny, content-specific, compelling state interest, etc.
I can not lay my hand on any power given to the Union Congress which allows them to shutdown the mail
Article 1 - Section 8 - Clause 7
The congress has the power, not the obligation, to establish the post office. If it wants to it can shut down any or all parts of the system (so long as it isn't in violation of the Amendments).
Very glad to see the Sen. Susan Collins bill expire.
The greatest cyber emergency threat to the Obama Regime is the revolt by the US citizens to overthrow it and hang Obama on a gallows at the Mall in DC with his Oligarchs he loves so dearly.
Barak Obam-Ah Barak Obam-Ah, Chick-a Chick-a Chick-a Boom. Barak Obam-Ah Barak Obam-Ah, Chick-a Chick-a Chick-a Boom, Rat Tat Tat.
Viva la Revolucion.
-308
...shouldn't be allowed to sponsor any legislation or be asked for her opinion until she has spent a year in the ghetto or gulag,
When asked, the politicians supporting this will most likely damn the Egypt government/leader for their actions in cutting communications channels for the Egyptian people as being an unjust censoring of free speach?
As for government institution connections to the internet - news flash! There are such things as firewalls, IDS, etc. ... which you are (mostly and hopefully) already using! When configured by someone who is not a brainless idiot, they do there job. And the "kill switch" you need for them connections is - in its simplest implementation - a wire cutter. Or a power switch.
Wondering, are there enough people aware in the US of the imminent dangers of all their communication habits being even more surveyed by the data retention plans?
"The right of the people to receive and provide information services without tracking, interception, or interruption thereof shall not be violated by the Government or agent thereof except by judicial warrant naming persons, data, and services to affected."
Amendment XXVIII of the U.S. Constitution, as I think it should be. We need to go on the offensive instead of watching Washington wonks progressively wank away our rights year after year... who wants to spearhead a campaign?
-1, Too Many Layers Of Abstraction
Why do I keep seeing the term "cyber" where the word "digital" or "computer" or "network" would be more meaningful?
It inspires little confidence in the high-level people advising our government on technology that they continue to describe technology in terms that are never heard in the real world. I don't think these people are technology people at all.
Just remember the threat that those in power are referring to is YOU.
In the information age, the modem is mightier than the cable franchise?
Honestly we need to start "backing up the Internet" by restoring the dial-up BBS infrastructure with some hard coper wire.
Also everybody should have references to some safe international DNS roots etc.
I am kind of stunned actually that the pirates havn't gone to sending their wares over the net strongly encrypted and using modem+BBS drop boxen for the key distribution just to ensure the stronger wire tapping law coverage. But thieves are never smart, its part of believing in theft.
Whatever we all come up with to back up and replace the Internet, we must carefully name it something else and ensure we don't use words like "digital" (computers are not actually "digital" [base 10] they are TTL discrete [base 2] technology) so that we can get a fresh go at all the laws that constrain those words. 8-)
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
"to swiftly respond to a significant threat."
Which threat? A civil uprising against the government?
It's like they built their own country inside the country.
And that is why most of these critical systems are "on the internet".
Most if not all oil rigs in the north sea are connected to land-based systems over fiber and a microwave link (for redundancy).
These land based systems need to be connected to the location where the engineers do their work on said systems.
To be able to do that work, you need live data from the plant both for analysis and logging.
The easiest way to do that is to have a restrictive firewall between the land-based system and the engineering network.
As the engineers need to have access to a myriad of documentation databases the workstations are connected to a corporate network... Said corporate network is of course connected to all kinds of gateways... including the internet.
Boom, you're on the internet. And usually this is no big deal.
You still have to get through 5-6 layers of networks, all of em highly monitored and restricted as much as possible without compromising the ability to do actual work... It is not a simple job at all, and it relies on there being bugs in software on all levels of firewalling to work. Fairly unlikely.
And... finally...
Lets say you manage to get into the control system of an oil rig in the north sea. What exactly are you going to try to do?
Cause an explosion? How are you going to do that?
Overload equipment? Well, the controllers will go bonkers with alarms if that condition were to even get close..
Going to screw with the emergency shutdown system? Sorry, you cant write to those controllers without going out into the field and flipping/turning a physical switch.
Cause process upset and cost the company money? Sure, you could do that.
Cause release of process material or damage to the plant? Bloody hard to do even with full source code access to the plant (which I happen to have for some of the rigs..).
Even with all that information I would still be hard pressed to do anything that the system wouldnt catch as an issue.. Alarms go off if you change anything while the system is running. Operators would be all over the issue before anything serious could happen.
Oh... and did I mention the hardwired safety system which will go to a safe state if you cut power? Yeah... In case of a major control system crash or attack you cut power to the whole fucker and it blows off pressure and resets to a safe state.
This is required by law and is checked at least annually over here. It is a major PITA but I wouldnt have it any other way.
Of course, having an air gap is the best way to secure it.
Unfortunately having said air gap makes everything quite a lot more expensive... and hard to use.. and much less flexible.
When it comes to issues like power grids there needs to be network connections between different sections of the grid for control purposes. In a spiffy nice happy-fun world these would run on dedicated fiber channels or other such separated networks... Unfortunately this is horribly expensive.. So expensive in fact that most would be fired for doing it :p
What most end up with is some sort of point-to-point encrypted tunneling communication channel that uses the internet for transport. Vendors will tell us all this is perfectly secure as there is no way for anyone to get into the datastream.... As long as you assume the encryption implementation is perfect.. "whops".
Another issue is that even with dedicated connections that are not "internet" connections.. most if not all providers of such networks have a management network on top of it.. If this network is compromised the separation of your expensively bought "private" network is well and throughly fucked.
If you hear a simple solution to a complex problem it is usually wrong :p
I'd bet there's far more critical infrastructure connected to the internet than you realize. In most cases, it's because:
(a) the systems are operated or monitored by remote personnel. This is common for infrastructure that is in remote locations.
(b) multiple components of the infrastrcture need to communicate with each other.
Creating private networks for these instances is usually cost prohibitive.
So there are hundreds of comments already posted here, but none of them that have been modded up that I can see points out that this isn't actually an "Internet Kill Switch" in any way shape or form. That's just a sensationalist title used to get people riled up and interested. This is, in fact, a much less interesting and less threatening piece of legislation. It just says the president can order companies running critical infrastructure for the functioning of our society to take action to protect them from a network attack in an emergency. No where does it grant the authority to shut down the internet or large swaths of it or censor any content.
Now this legislation is not without problems and it certainly should more clearly define what is meant by critical infrastructure, but seriously, there is a reason this bill is supported from both sides of the aisle and it had fuck all to do with people's conspiracy theories about censorship and control of the media and communication. This is just an inadequately worded bill doing exactly what internet security experts have been asking for right along; precautions put in place to quickly isolate critical systems that likely shouldn't be accessible in the first place but often are in one way or another. This is about Stuxnet and the possibility of network based attacks on real hardware and resources from foreign powers. No politicians in the US have any interest in shutting down the internet because we still have robust means of communication otherwise and it would be political suicide.
"This past March, the Senateâ(TM)s Sergeant at Arms reported that the computer systems of the Executive Branch agencies and the Congress are now under cyber attack an average of 1.8 BILLION times per month."
The fuck you are. DoD reports on the order of tens of thousands of "attacks" against them YEARLY.
You don't get to count every ping, spam, packet, scan and automated garbage as a "cyber attack". Well you can but you would (have already) loose all credibility in the process.
"Rather than granting a âoekill switch,â S. 3480 would make it far less likely for a President to use the broad authority he already has in current law to take over communications networks."
In other words since you already have the authority to do whatever the hell you want this whole exercise is redundant? If this is the case why bother with new legislation?
I don't know of any operators who would not take reasonable steps to mitigate problems if the USG had specific information about a credible problem where public safety or life critical systems were involved. Do you? Is there any evidence whatsoever this is a problem?
I would add it is quite foolish to think one can address a "cyber attack" as in "war" in linear time or on timescales in which humans have any chance of reacting. Chances are your advsaries have already compromised the system well in advance. For all you know failure to check in due to service disruption could well result in pre-programmed failsafe action.
True emergency, as in "the secrecy of ACTA is a question of national security". sorry folks. Nobody believes your lies any more.
What happened to freedom of speech?
Be it by email, voip, blogging, stupid twitter posts, or speech in the form of changing your status on Facebook from 'Single' to "I'm doing the Dougie in the pants off dance off...' it all is speech.
And the government is supposed to keep it's hand off my facebook status updates...
I know that many admins might look at this as seeing a nail while holding a hammer
Then there are the lawyer-types (including most politicians) and MBA-types (running large companies). They see a screw while holding a screwdriver, and proceed to hammer the screw with the handle of the screwdriver. That's why utilities which have no business being connected to the internet are so vulnerable.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
I hope someone guns that bitch down in a violent bloodbath.
If Stuxnet gets imitated by script kiddies or black hats, they could damage seriously infrastructure like the Hoover dam in the example in TFA. Another example, they could target the systems that control burners in power plants. Even if they cannot manage to produce enough damage to put the power plant off line, they could cause enough damage to produce a generalized decrement across all the power plants of a given operator or builder and hitting the consumers with higher energy prices and a sharp increase in pollution. The repairs in those burners take at least a pair of weeks to get fixed and need to take the units off-line. The cascade effect of this could in the end produce roving, prolonged blackouts with the economic damage that they entail. A smart terrorist wet dream. This is the kind of risk that they should be targeting even if they end helping a bit the iranians or north koreans when more and more control systems get migrated to unfit systems to the task running Windows.
Mexico: 100% conservative's America now!
Oh it's completely different. Egypt did it to hurt its citizens. The US is dong it to protect the internet.
kill switch fine but if it was unwarranted then prison time for those that infringed the constitution
The Constitution itself says you can't do that. This has been uphedl by courts, look here for an example of how it works.
The only answer is NOT having stupid legislation that go against basic human liberty. If a private bank is being DDOSed, let them hire better system administrators who will know how to configure their routers.
Actually if the US were doing what Egypt would then the government likely wouldn't covered that as freedom of speech and claim it's the act of terrorists, it incites violence and basically use every rule for speech to ensure you don't have the freedom to express yourself.
I think that some states actually do have a TV kill switch, though that is not it's intended purpose. Emergency Broadcast Systems allow for an immediate government override of TV broadcasts, for use in the event of extreme emergencies ("Chemical plant exploded, acid cloud spreading, evacuate."). There is no reason it couldn't be used to shut down TV for a time, though any prolonged use would result in at the very least legal action from the broadcasters, and possibly just some engineer being sent to the transmitter with a screwdriver and instructions to override the EBS by physically bypassing it.
Something they DESIGNED with the PURPOSE of being RESISTENT TO ATTACK they want to TURN OFF.
I say we fake attacks just to get them to TURN IT OFF ALL THE TIME. That in itself is an ATTACK. Own goal.
Oh no irony there.
I think the People need a "Kill Switch' to shut off stupid Governments... ''During times of universal deciet, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act''
this "kill switch" strives to cut off communication.
however, the exact purpose it is intended for is failure by design:
when the internet kill switch comes and is being used, everyone will know the revolution has come, its time to get the guns out of the closet and kick the government out of their office.
Everyone knows how they misconceived Bills in the past. They left enough loopholes in Bills, and back doors. Any branch of Government could read the Bill as they saw fit.
Since the republicrats and democans have already abused the constitution by considering it nothing more than a God-Damned piece of paper why not install a kill switch to the only thing that ensures an almost absolute freedom of speech? After all if the federal government can violate the 9th and 10th ammendments why not the 1st? What? Do you honestly think this is only going to be used to stop the terrorists? Just like the Patriot Act was used to stop terrorists? Actually it was enacted to limit the freedoms of the citizens of America and nothing else. This kill swith will be used to limit the freedoms of the citizens as well. If you are now going to complain after voting republicrat or democan, shut up and go sit on the sidelines. You've already demonstrated that you want an intrusive, activist government, you have no room to complain now. You ASKED FOR THIS.
-bob
"You seem... to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions --- a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy.
"Our judges are as honest as other men, and not more so. They have, with others, the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps.... Their power is the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots. It has more wisely made all the departments co-equal and co-sovereign within themselves.
"...But the Chief Justice says there must be an arbiter somewhere. True there must, but the ultimate arbiter is the people, as represented by their deputies in the State Legislatures. Let the States decide to which they meant to give power, and amend the constitution if necessary."
Thomas Jefferson - 1820
Since the power of Judicial Review is not expressly granted to the Supreme Court by the Constitution, this power is "reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." It is not the Union judiciary's responsibility to give power to itself or to its neighboring branches. They cannot take what the Member States have never given to them. Proper procedure requires an amendment granting the power FIRST, before the union government can act.
Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
And Obama is demanding that they turn it back on...hypocritical?
The Union congress does indeed have the power to close the post office, but they do NOT have the power to forbid a Member State (example: Virginia) from setting-up its own post office for its own citizens.
Nor do they have the power to prevent private entrepreneurs like FedEx or UPS to fill the gap left behind by the USPS's extinction. The Congressional power does not extend to abolition.
Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
> The only substantial threat to the internet is censorship (whether by governments or corporations).
"whether"? Please explain the distinction.
Obama has kill-switch envy.
The internet is the ultimate free speech tool. What the government wants is the authority to turn off certain speakers, which they have identified as a "threat" without having to go through the public and inconvenient court system. They currently have the authority to arrest people, seize their servers, and otherwise shutdown "threats" to the internet. They want more.
If they want authority for an "internet kill switch", fine. But the executive branch needs to have specific checks for it within the legislative and judicial branches of government. That they haven't proposed and explained such checks themselves just proves that this is a POWER GRAB by the executive branch and another attempt to circumvent the constitutional protection of the rights and powers of the citizenry.
Then say you cannot hurt anyone by witholding data. May you need recent medical data relevant to your
surgery, and not be able to get it. THEN talk that talk.
The fundamental problem with legislating protection of the internet is that private companies don't care. Protection costs money, and the customers won't pay. The solution is to have the "toobes" owned and operated by the federal government. Not the servers or content, just the wires. From the backbones right down to the wires connecting your house/apartment (the last mile). As a government run department they can ensure it's completely secure (and block spam and kiddy porn at the same time). They could even block "illegal" content like wikileaks or music downloads, and monitor all our traffic. Why would we want this? Because it also means network neutrality and bigger pipes. With the gov paying for it, all the content providers will lobby hard for higher speeds. So we get gigabit internet, network neutrality, and we can still read wikileaks through crypto/ssh.
Hitler started with many of the same civic minded goals. Gun Control, Censorship, etc. all in the name protecting the citizens.... Those who don't learn from history are doomed to relive it.
Marco
You know, I agree with you. Except I'd settle for bringing in a fleet of moving vans, helping all those good folks evacuate, then nuking it. The denizens who are behind all this mess can be housed in Guantanamo until we decide to figure out what to do with them.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
The Union congress does indeed have the power to close the post office, but they do NOT have the power to forbid a Member State (example: Virginia) from setting-up its own post office for its own citizens.
Says who? I'm only familiar with Article 4 which enumerates the states powers and doesn't include post offices, and the 10th amendment which reserves to the states respectively any powers the Constitution did not delegate to the United States. Establishing a post office is clearly delegated to the United States.
Nor do they have the power to prevent private entrepreneurs like FedEx or UPS to fill the gap left behind by the USPS's extinction.
Article I - Section 8 - Clause 3 (aka the interstate commerce clause)
Even if you ignore the above it's going to be hard to replace the USPS with FedEx or UPS if the congress says "you can't carry mail between states".
Let the ones with a commercial interest in keeping the internet operating defend everything, like it is now. Let the Google's, Amazon's and NetFlix's, and.. all the network operators stop the attacks. I mean what would some bureaucrat(s) care?
...because these are the same fools that are hooking up critical systems to the internet. If we can get across that you should keep critical systems isolated, then maybe this whole crapfest will be moot.
When the poors get uppity we'll have to cut their connection.
It's totally amazing to me how a RINO politician can watch whats happening in Egypt and not have a clue that it couldn't happen here. How many lies do you need to hear from this administration before you see the truth. It's time for you to retire, you know not of what you do for the people of this country, truely the last totally free nation of this world.
...I thought this was the very purpose of the internet; to be able to automatically adjust and stay up, despite physical / network based attacks? Why is this legislation necessary in the least?
In a related note, I personally make sure to strap dynamite to each of my legs any time I go hiking.
It's only sensible, if my foot ever gets caught while I am running away from a bear or a wolf I need a way to remove it quickly and reliably.
I also strap bombs to my arms while swimming. You know, just in case.
Security is mostly a superstition... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. - Helen Keller
NT
And what is good, Phaedrus, And what is not good... Need we ask anyone to tell us these things?
Unpatriotic Bastards!
You totally can, which is why it's too bad this actually waters down existing legislation in favor of letting the government do something useful with it (like create an office to coordinate defense against large-scale and technologically sophisticated attacks.)
Funny isn't. These Senators will allow any and every imaginable gun be sold, purchased and carried on the street under the 2nd Amendment, but fear the 1st Amendment so much that they have no problem finding ways to restrict it. Free Speech is an easy target because even the strict constitutionalists won't oppose any restrictions in speech.
Actually, I did ask for this. I read the bill, there's no kill switch, the people saying otherwise are morons, and I'd rather have clean water than live as a serf in a neo-feudalistic plutocracy run by anarcho-capitalists anyday thankyouverymuch.
Any senator that proposes somethign like this should be thrown from office automatically. What part of the First Amendment does she not understand?
we can make our independent network
How about cut all the bureaucratic "crap" that is in Washington (i.e. needless jobs) and spend that money to help industry develop a SECURE internet. President "Oh Butthead" is truly the Emperor with No Clothing. The Man child so Arrogant and content in his own ignorance to believe that the American People trust him. He is merely a pawn in the Chicago political machine. He is a Buffoon (scratch that) a Buffoon typically plays that role in a circus. He is a high functioning Idiot with delusions of Godhood. His favorite posts to positions are militant lesbians (nothing against lesbians, but what is his motivation there?). I don't know what the draw is there....but he married one so go figure.
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke
What is amazing is if we disconnect the net those things go down anyway.
Probably not. That is a tool you can only wield once, and for a limited amount of time. Those of us in the world outside the US will see this action as an act of terrorism in itself, and will take steps to work around it. From that point, the relevance of the US will be non-existent.
Well, I think there is a three word answer to that "The TEA Party".....the government is scared Sh__ less by these people. The Fifth column 75% of America strong that wants their country back. Here in "Gunless" Illinois, the place many of you will obtain your concealed carry firearms (Springfield armory, rock river arms, and more) we cant conceal carry because of Chicago. and their inability (either through ignorance or corruption) to govern themselves. The "kill switch" would be used only for graft and corruption. and remember, just like the "test of the emergency broadcast system" the Kill switch will have to be "regularly tested"......anybody think of that yet? When will the tests occur? During live podcasts by the right, Limbaugh Hannity, Liddy? During when say a political rebuttal online? The possibilities are endless. How about we BAN big government and make 2012 Judgment Day for the Libs......boot em out!!!! This is like giving an arsonist keys and matches and sending them into a fireworks factory. nothing good can come of this.
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke
Exactly. We don't want the government to have any more power to regulate the internet than it already does, especially when it comes to a kill switch. History shows that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Anyone with half a brain knows that will eventually be misused.
"Oh no, of course its nothing like the kill switch used in Egypt - WE will only use it for good" (of course, so thinks Mubarak)
Since the power of Judicial Review is not expressly granted to the Supreme Court by the Constitution, this power is "reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." It is not the Union judiciary's responsibility to give power to itself or to its neighboring branches.
And if the States are not bothering to fight it, is it really an illegal action? In theory, yes. In practice however, I think you'd have a hard time convincing those in power of that fact. That is where your view and the view of everyone else falls apart. You talk of how things are in theory, we talk of how things would and have played out in the real world.
"I'm not sure I like the fugnutish tone you used in your post!" -RogL (608926)-
All the brouhaha over a theoretical “kill-switch” overlooks a larger and more real risk of centralized control of the Internet. This commentary, “Could it happen here?,” puts this debate in the context of the current state of broadband access in the US and potential action by Congress and the FCC. http://tinyurl.com/4hb3m2d
Who the fuck do they think they are?
The U.S. military has no shortage of devices — many of them classified — that could restore connectivity to a restive populace cut off from the outside world by its rulers. It’s an attractive option for policymakers who want an option for future Egypts, between doing nothing and sending in the Marines. And it might give teeth to the Obama administration’s demand that foreign governments consider internet access an inviolable human right.
How about staying the fuck out of other countries and their policies? If the US wants to play good neighbor, it could start by complying with UN resolutions, and trying to pass this crap through the UN like it should.
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?