Slashdot Mirror
How Putin Tried To Control the Internet (vice.com)
derekmead writes: In this excerpt from the recently published The Red Web, Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan describe how the Kremlin has been trying to rewrite the rules for the internet to make it "secure" as it is understood by Russia's secret services. "Vladimir Putin was certain that all things in the world—including the internet—existed with a hierarchical, vertical structure. He was also certain that the internet must have someone controlling it at the top. He viewed the United States with suspicion, thinking the Americans ruled the web and that it was a CIA project. Putin wanted to end that supremacy. Just as he attempted to change the rules inside Russia, so too did he attempt to change them for the world. The goal was to make other countries, especially the United States, accept Russia's right to control the internet within its borders, to censor or suppress it completely if the information circulated online in any way threatened Putin's hold on power."
Freedom and government are mutually antagonistic concepts.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
But this reads purely as propaganda.
"Putin is Lawful Evil, guys. He wants to control the Internet! He wants to rule over it, and over YOU, and you should hate and fear and oppose whatever he does because that's what's good for America!"
It may be largely true, maybe, that Putin believes that Russia should have domain over the Internet as it exists within Russia's borders, and there's certainly some precedent for that. Even sense. Nation-states exist to further their own interests, and the interests of their citizens.
The USA installs leaders in third world nations all over the globe based on the single, sole criteria of how loyal they are to the USA.
Russia does the exact same thing.
Great Briton did the exact same thing in the past.
The People's Republic of China will do the exact same thing in the future.
It's not news at all that governments seek to control the affairs of their citizens domestically and as much as they can internationally. This is the world of global politics. It's not different simply because it deals with the Internet; that's not to say it's necessarily good, or moral, or even wise, but that's how the game is played.
Check out my sci-fi book "Lacuna" at http://goo.gl/MVxX8
Instead of bickering like a bunch of little children about who can play with the toy - perhaps we could all learn to share.
Political correctness is really just herd psychology pushed by insecure people who desperately seek social conformity.
In Soviet Russia, the internet is searching you!
With Snowden's revelations about XKEYSCORE, Putin's suspicions were proved just about completely true.
Then you're a fool. The US wants to eavesdrop on everything said on the net, and that's bad. The Russians want to control what's said on the net, and that's worse.
never thought i would ever post that.
Wow Putin's troll brigade is out in full force. Dasvidanya Comrade.
Really? The US is far from benevolent, but it's far more benevolent than Russia in terms of censorship and dragging you off in the middle of the night to the gulag.
Exactly! Putin has blood on his hands.
Wow that's a lot different then how the US is trying to control the internet. Yay for thinking out of the box!
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Whatever method Putin tried to control the internet probably involved him not wearing a shirt.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
We're so lucky we have Great Leader Obama to protect us from Putin's Evil Plans.
Bah!! Bullshit.
Eavesdrop now under guise of national security, control later under the guise of national security. Not much difference. Given time, America is well on their way to the same shit.
If you're neither American nor Russian, neither of these is a good idea. And we trust neither of you in the long run.
But let's not pretend there's a fundamental difference.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
He's not a troll, he's a likho. Putin would never employ inferior non-Russian mythological creatures!
The War of 1812... the good 'ol days when the federal government actually tried to save New Orleans.
I had the same problem with a manager back when the Internet was new and we were beginning to use it where I worked. He called me in one day and wanted to know exactly WHO ran it and how they could be reached if necessary. When I explained that there was no one person, organization or country that ran it an how it was a network or more or less independent networks he really couldn't get his head around that at all. I guess it was kind of mind blowing for him coming from a background in SNA ( IBM System Network Architecture). I guess I got off easy. I sure as hell wouldn't have wanted to be the one that gave that news to Putin.
How is this a Putin thing? Many if not most other governments are trying different approaches to pretty much the same goal (e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/..., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...).
Judging by the number of cat videos.
Have gnu, will travel.
So the Russian government doesn't have any clue about the internet and wants to control it and control what content may and may not be published.
*sniff* I never thought that I'd live to see the day when the Russkies embrace our culture!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Actually, he's pretty much right. Most people miss things by scale or by inappropriate extension of analogy.
To be on the Internet, you must connect to a service provider, or somehow jack into the thing. There are peering agreements and everything. This is like being a citizen of a nation, with free trade agreements with other nations.
Problem: you have literally billions of people emigrating every second, all carrying messages, many of them encoded, and only with the identity of where they officially disembarked from. If they disembarked from a friend's house or a hotel to travel to Turkistan, their identity is the friend's house or the hotel.
Anyone who can infiltrate any location or pretend to be from some other location is now impossible to identify. There may be better facilities at the destination, but hardly anyone uses a Photo ID (certificate authentication). On top of that, there's just so much traffic you have no way to analyze it all; much of it is encoded anyway, and secret organizations can use other people's locations as bases of operations to send coded messages around and through other intermediary clearing houses to hide their origins *and* their activities.
Oh, sure, if you can find them, you can revoke their access, prevent them from sending from that place anymore. Maybe you can physically arrest the individual. It happens to be very hard, though, because you're trying to control every interaction every individual has, without being able to positively identify any individual.
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You can take the boy out of the KGB, but you'll never get the KGB out of the boy.
I need a wheelchair van for my son. Help me get the word out. https://www.gofundme.com/wheelchair-van-for-jj
how-putin-tried-to-control-the-internet (In Russian)
In short: Russian govt (Comms Ministry and Comms Supervision: Minkomsvyaz and Roskomnadzor) had performed a simulation of disconnect of Russia from the global Internet this spring. They have found that Russia is still connected, and they could not understand by what means it stays connected. They think that the problem is in lots of small providers (up to 11000 Internet providers licenses total) that have satellite links abroad.
Full Disclosure: I live in Russia. And I am quite glad that the experiment failed.
I'll just leave this here.
You have to click the sorting cell, or if you are too lazy, here's a spoiler:
USA #2
Russian Federation #11
Of course this only includes countries we can know these numbers, North Korea isn't #1 as their numbers are not known
"If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
The same? There has not been a single misdeed done by the US in the last 100 years, that USSR/Russia or China has not exceeded with gusto in the last 50.
You, spoiled Westerners, simply don't realize, how deeply evil your opponents are. After moving to the US, I was flabbergasted, for example, over people sincerely comparing Senator McCarthy (responsible for several dozen people losing their jobs) with Beria (responsible for several million people losing their lives).
The US — under the internationally-celebrated moron named Obama — may have been sponsoring "moderate terrorists" in Syria in the last couple of years, but the USSR/Russia has been sponsoring — arming and protecting — the very Assad regime for decades.
And note too, how reluctant Russia is to bomb the real assholes in today's Syria — the ISIS. So reluctant, one may be forgiven for suspecting, Russia had a hand in ISIS springing into existence in the first place...
"The same" my tail.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
That's a nice list you put together — omitting only defense from the external enemies as a legitimate undertaking for any government. But why is the same government, which is supposed to be involved in the above-mentioned tasks, is also involved in providing healthcare, education, food and shelter and other "welfare"?
Now, of course, you did not mean to say, your list is exclusive, but I find it strange, that you listed the things, on which the government spends the smallest portions of its budget... One would expect a post like yours to put the biggest appropriations first...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Every bit of control over the Internet, that the US surrenders, is the bit, that governments like China and Russia pick up.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
To go further on the path of tightening the screws, having laws that limit the rights and freedoms of people, attacking the news media and organizations of civil society, is a destructive path with no future.
-Mikhail G.
Incarceration isn't the same as disappeared.
Lawyers are allowed. Visitation is allowed.
Not many political rivals are killed in the USA. Can't say that in Russia.
"Vladimir Putin was certain that ..."
Oh no!! Telepaths are real!!!11
"The Russians want to control what's said on the net, and that's worse".
Er, any evidence?
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
It never ceases to amaze me that he's got a group of shills for Slashdot. I had no idea we were so important.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
> Americans ruled the web
Yes, more precisely the NSA.
> it was a CIA project
Yes, more precisely NSA.
> accept Russia's right to control the internet within its borders
This line is so obvious there can be no question about it. When in Russia, it is necessary to obey the laws which Russian Duma imposes. Laws apply to companies, people, animals, plants and electrons alike. Don't like it, don't come to Russia or if already inside, become a "refusenik" and leave Russia for good.
When Putin replaced Yeltsin the times when Russia could be pushed aside or into a corner ended.
In Soviet Russia you control internet.
Effects in GCHQ (...) Now major part of business - 5% of Operations
Propaganda, Deception, Mass messaging, Pushing stories, Alias development, Psychology (quotes from the EFF slides, punctuation is mine)
While I do think controlling the content of the Internet is wrong, and I'm glad the Russians can't do it, it seems wrong to criticize those who wanted to do it in self-defense from people who is actually controlling it, specially without mentioning that and pretending they were paranoid.
US incarnation complex
Wow, things have evolved in strange ways since I last learned about the US government.
You need to install an RTFM interface.
1. Russians were (in various ways still are) bad in psy-ops. Internet, as a great medium for subverting Russians was (and still is), a threat to the regime. For better or worse for the Russians being subverted, is a separate question - but in that regard, the generals were correct. :)
2. Controlling the internet the Chinese way is certainly a way to mitigate the psy-warfare, but the cost is way too high. Not going to preach merits of free flow of information and discussion to the slashdot choir.
3. As Russians got better at waging this war, they realized there are ways to deal with this within the existing Internet framework.
Overall, the article is an anti-Russian and anti-Putin propaganda piece, which is not surprising nor remarkable (not that it matters much though, as it does raise a few valid concerns).
What is more important today is not what the article is about. The biggest potential problem with the Internet architecture is the possibility of the US cutting off Russia's access to it, should the relationship between the two countries degrade to that level. This is not a theoretical scenario; Apple and Google went as far as shutting off their services for a part of Russia, and that can be seen as a first step of cutting Russia off the network. This prompted the Russian Security Council (that really makes all high level decisions in the country) to consider providing an alternative system that can be switched to in case of things going down fast. I suspect this system, once live, may be seriously considered for switching over to, partly for the reasons outlined in the article, with the "rest of the internet" accessible through some sort of a government-controlled gateway. Which would be a loss for everyone, but what are you going to do.
It's called TPP, you can read the "IP" Chapter and find out who controls the Internet, all in the name of protecting the bottom line of huge Media Corps.
When the copyright term is "forever minus a day", live every day like it's the last.
butt hurt Americans trying the old slam campaign approach. Get over it. You sponsor some groups of terrorists...he's just gonna bomb all terrorists. Assad is the legitimate president whether USA likes it or not. That makes all armed opposition terrorist and USA a terrorist supporter. And USA is butt hurt now that it has been proven that it made less strikes against ISIS in a year than in 6 days of bombing Yugoslavia and that Putin hit more targets in a day than they did in a month. They even managed to blow up a hospital. And now the typical media propaganda attempt on all sites. Pathetic
Full Disclosure: I live in Russia. And I am quite glad that the experiment failed.
Failed? No, it provided a roadmap.
What Russia needs to do to control the domestic network is start consolidating/nationalizing the ISP sector so that you end up with half a dozen big ISPs which can then be controlled by the government directly or indirectly.
Next the network hardware market will need to be heavily regulated so that only approved entities can legally get access to the equipment necessary to establish satellite or radio uplinks.
With this in place the rogue uplink problem can be eliminated and Putin can have his control. So I'd look out for those things starting to happen, if they do you have 5-10 years of internet freedom left before the lockdown sets in.
sigs are hazardous to your health
I've always used both Britain and The British, or Ireland or The Irish when referring to governments. It tends to be pretty bloody clear from the context as to what/who you're referring to. Some people really seem to go out of their way to get annoyed...
It's very convenient to start counting *after* WW2, isn't it.
So is the UN.
You'll grow up, eventually. Until then, know that I read your post but really don't see any reason to give you a detailed reply. Look back, in twenty years or so, and marvel at the gibberish you typed on the internet.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Sorry? What was that?
I couldn't understand you over all that shit falling out of your mouth...
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Sorry, even in a discussion overrun with nationalistic idiots you're fucking reaching beyond the bounds of credibility.
a - what the fuck does the US have to do with whether Putin has blood on his hands
b - when the fuck would US 'murderous foreign politics' in any way remotely justify Putin's behaviour
c - how the fuck is US or Russian activity prior to Putin taking power relevant to this conversation
d - why the fuck would you use 'murderous foreign politics' to describe the US without using identical language to Russia
e - I can't find any reliable figures for foreign policy related deaths from either the US or the USSR/Russia, but take a peek at this: https://www.hawaii.edu/powerki...
The USSR isn't looking too healthy a place to live from '46 to '87; that's more deaths than the whole Korean war, Vietnam, the Gulf war and the invasion of Iraq combined, and America was only one of multiple nations involved in those major conflicts.
Do you have any evidence at all to back up your claim of "The number dwarves in comparison" or are you as big a fuckwit as your posts suggests?
more anti Putin anti Russia propaganda,