EU wants shared control of Internet

[CHIMO]

By AOIFE WHITE
Friday, September 30, 2005 Posted at 12:48 PM EDT
Associated Press

BRUSSELS, Belgium — The European Union insisted Friday that governments and the private sector must share the responsibility of overseeing the Internet, setting the stage for a showdown with the United States on the future of Internet governance.

"The EU ... is very firm on this position," he added.

At issue is who would have ultimate authority over the Internet's master directories, which tell Web browsers and e-mail programs how to direct traffic.

Policy decisions could at a stroke make all websites ending in a specific suffix essentially unreachable. Other decisions could affect the availability of domain names in non-English characters or ones dedicated to special interests such as pornography.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050930.gteusep30/BNStory/Technology/

[derby378]

1. Go ahead. Try to control it. I dare ya.

We'll just find a way to bypass you altogether.

[CHIMO]

3. Ya

Like why share when it is already controlled?

[cyberpj]

6. FBI to get veto power over PC software?

FBI to get veto power over PC software?

September 27, 2005 11:37 AM PDT
FBI to get veto power over PC software?

The Federal Communications Commission thinks you have the right to use software on your computer only if the FBI approves.

No, really. In an obscure "policy" document
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-05-151A1.pdf
released around 9 p.m. ET last Friday, the FCC announced this remarkable decision.

According to the three-page document, to preserve the openness that characterizes today's Internet, "consumers are entitled to run applications and use services of their choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement." Read the last seven words again.

The FCC didn't offer much in the way of clarification. But the clearest reading of the pronouncement is that some unelected bureaucrats at the commission have decreeed that Americans don't have the right to use software such as Skype or PGPfone if it doesn't support mandatory backdoors for wiretapping. (That interpretation was confirmed by an FCC spokesman on Monday, who asked not to be identified by name. Also, the announcement came at the same time as the FCC posted its wiretapping rules for Internet telephony.)

more...
http://news.com.com/2061-10804_3-5884130.html?tag=nefd.aon

[CHIMO]

7. Looks

To me like it is becoming a "spaghetti monster".

How does someone in say Europe, that has to access something in say Japan, avoid going through the US if there isn't dedicated paths to each country?

I am not that knowledgeable on the communications bit, but as I understand it, packets can go off over all different routes to arrive at one's desktop. So how can one lawmaker include all requirements, unless they restrict access through portals between each country, on a country by country basis or groups of countries to other groups?

[Realityhack]

8. HELP! - A plea to the international open sorce comunity

We are under attack from our government... I can't program and can't trust domestic softare any more...

Help us with VOIP software with strong encryption thats made outside the FBIs jurisdiction.

Oh wait... I am not 'intitled' to run it... Fuck-em with a frikin power drill.

Help us PLEASE!!

[acmejack]

2. Just another agreement we changed our minds on!

I would be a lot more comfortable with international control of the root servers. It is more threatening to our interests to have our government maintain sole control.

[JVS]

4. Makers keepers

[neweurope]

5. Hallelujah! I was afraid the EU was fast asleep...

Related story:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4938032


----------------------

Remember Fallujah

Bush to The Hague!

[Realityhack]

9. As I said in another thread...

they should just set up their own top level servers... make it illegal for anyone to point to ours... then tell us we can either both turn over our severs... or they will stop routing packets to any US owned company including those pesky kayman island ones... see how fast we bend to that.

[VegasWolf]

10. LOL. Republican Corporations lose access to the Cayman Islands.

That would be tantamount to sedition for these clowns. We would have to give up control in nanoseconds or these corporations would start having to carry their share of the taxes!!

[Demeter]

11. I Am Amused By the Concept

If China cannot control the Internet, what makes the US or Europe think they can? The best they can do is make it illegal, and try to shut it down, like drugs. Remember drug waars, guys? Those were really successful, weren't they? Or samizdat in the USSR--putting all the mimeograph machines under local and key.

Information is like water. (and propaganda is like LSD).

[CHIMO]

12. My Understanding

I think, is different than most of the other posts.

It seems to me that everyone is discussing the content on the internet and not the means which are utilized to transfer the content.

My understanding of the control, or permission, is on the means and not the content. As they say the devil is in the details, but if one has control of the channels then one can eventually control the content.

Sort of a black box approach.

[Demeter]

13. It's Not Rocket Science, Though

The means of control are not within the hands of the few and privileged.

[CHIMO]

15. It Is

Not even science.(Don't know why rocket science is the only science?)

Everyone has to communicate over the internet(s) on some wires. Controlling the wires controls the internet(s).
The wires are a physical reality that can be controlled.

So when someone is going to control the internet, they have to control the wires. Which one government doesn't control.

To have access, one must have the connection. To impose control, or to try and impose control, when one does not have that authority is futile. You either co-operate or you live in your own environment and the one that you create.

[Demeter]

16. Wires Are Not That Expensive, Difficult or Obvious

I can see us stringing wires while Bush tries to cut them down. I can see him trying to interdict shiploads of copper, fiber optic cable, etc. I can see total failure.

The technology and the manufacturing are less complicated than washing machines, also smaller and cheaper.

[pushycat]

14. Agreed. Control the means and you control the content. eom

[demobrit]

17. EU and US clash over control of Internet

GENEVA The United States and Europe clashed in one of their sharpest public disagreements in months, after European Union negotiators proposed stripping the Americans of their effective control of the Internet.

http://www.iht.com/bin/print_ipub.php?file=/articles/2005/09/29/business/net.php

[tainowarrior]

18. I'm so sick of the U.S.

really, I'm really really really SICK of this country and its arrogance.

[never cry wolf]

19. Another dividend from the busihie admin... here's a snip...

"It's a very shocking and profound change of the EU's position," said David Gross, the State Department official in charge of America's international communications policy. "The EU's proposal seems to represent an historic shift in the regulatory approach to the Internet from one that is based on private sector leadership to a government, top-down control of the Internet."

Delegates meeting in Geneva for the past two weeks had been hoping to reach consensus for a draft document by Friday after two years of debate. The talks on international digital issues, called the World Summit on the Information Society and organized by the United Nations, were scheduled to conclude in November at a meeting in Tunisia. Instead, the talks have deadlocked, with the United States fighting a solitary battle against countries that want to see a global body take over supervision of the Internet.

The United States lost its only ally late Wednesday when the EU made a surprise proposal to create an intergovernmental body that would set principles for running the Internet. Currently, the U.S. Commerce Department approves changes to the Internet's "root zone files," which are administered by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or Icann, a nonprofit organization based in Marina del Rey, California.

Political unease with the U.S. approach, symbolized by opposition to the war in Iraq, has spilled over into these technical discussions, delegates said. The EU and developing nations, they added, wanted to send a signal to America that it could not run things alone. Opposition to Washington's continued dominance of the Internet was illustrated by a statement released last week by the Brazilian delegation to the talks. "On Internet governance, three words tend to come to mind: lack of legitimacy. In our digital world, only one nation decides for all of us."

[day2]

23. Gov't vs private ownership. The US is right in this case.

From my take the EU wants gov'ts to be in charge of the internet vs privately run.

Can you say 1984?? I'll take private ownership anyday. The US is right in this case

[agincourt]

25. Unfortunately,

We can have a privatized 1984 as well as a state sponsored one.

[bemildred]

26. Welcome to DU.

The Internet was invented by the government (DARPA) and has
always had its central functions in the hands of public entities.
There are lots of private users, and private infrastructure
providers, corporate and individual, but none of them run or
control it or own it.

[MellowOne]

20. How does anyone control the internet?

Not getting it, sorry.

[bemildred]

22. That is what annoys me about it. The dufus-like lack of clue.

If these Lusers knew what they were talking about
if would not be as funny though. :rofl:

[stepnw1f]

21. There is That Word Again: "Control" (nt)

[neweurope]

24. Please remember that PNAC wants control of the internet.

They have said so very clearly.

I had much, much rather that there is an international body who controls it.

-----------------------

Remember Fallujah

Bush to The Hague!

[Wrinkle_In_Time]

27. There is a disturbing amount of jingoistic sentiment in this thread. n/t