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No Internet “kill Switch” For Australia
An anonymous reader writes "Well, it looks as though at least some Governments have a backbone. Egypt switched off its internet to stop protests over the past few days, and the US Government is considering legislation that will give the President 'kill switch' powers over the internet as well. But in Australia, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy — best known for his attempt to filter the country's internet for child pornography and the country's flagship national fibre broadband rollout, says such a scenario couldn't occur."
Honestly? The only way to get rid of unelected officials is constitutional reform. I really thought this was going to be the generation to do it, but it seems there's too many of us around who have fond memories of standing on the assembly ground to God Save The Queen.. and we can't talk about changing the constitution without talking about finally pulling our finger out and cutting the safety line to mother England. Or, ya know, we could petition the US to become their 52nd state - right after Israel.. I keed, I keed!
How we know is more important than what we know.
Egypt shows that the killswitch can't be used for more than a week or so because business and Government both complain that they need it to do their work and keep things running. If it lasted a week in Egypt I reckon it would last a day in the US. At the same time people are good networkers and they know how to get the word out. An intranet can be a wifi card and a copy of mediawiki, though I am sure the solutions used in Egypt were pretty low tech. In short the kill switch does more damage than good. It can't be used for any length of time and it is pretty easy to work around. You may as well switch off the water and see how far you get.
http://michaelsmith.id.au