U.S. Government Proposes "Internet Kill Switch"

[geldonyetich]

So, let me get this straight:

"Oh nos! The hax are here! TURN OFF THE INTERNET, QUICK!"

Methinks Mr. Lieberman has a rather simple view of how the Internet works.

People's bank accounts and whatnot aren't suddenly going to be vulnerable to a massive attack, because there's no universal means to get in there an hack them, and if the bank that runs those accounts is smart they won't make it all that easy to do. The worse that'll happen is that those giant botnets will be used to spam down an important site to make it inaccessible. Turning off the entire Internet would simply achieve their goal for them on a larger scale.

 

[Daverson]

Surely turning off the internet during a time of crisis would worsen things? Most people rely on electronic news sources these days. I mean for example:

Crisis 1: Terrorists denote an explosive
Internet gets turned off: People assume the internet is broken because the Russopeans/Chapanese/Islamistanis have BLOWN UP THE DATA CENTRES! IT'S AN INVASION! GET YOUR GUN! SHOOT ANYONE IN A UNIFORM!

Crisis 2: A small earthquake
Internet gets turned off: IT'S A SUPERQUAKE! WASHINGTON HAS BEEN DESTROYED! GET YOUR GUN! SHOOT THE GROUND! IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO STOP THE SANDWORMS!

I could go on.

It doesn't help that "Lieberman" really sounds like the name you'd give a Bond villain.

 

[LeonLethality]

People are reacting like at the drop of the hat they would turn off the internet. The people running this are probably smarter than you think and would only do something this serious in case of an emergency.

 

[mocruz1200]

Oh yeah?

Well the US government can suck my cock.

this

 

[Aceptdtctv]

"We cannot afford to wait for a cyber-9/11 before our government realizes the importance of protecting our cyber-resources," said bill co-sponsor Senator

did anyone else picture a terrorists using flight simulators to crash into www.worldtradecentre.com?

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

This is giving the US government even more global power. Let me know when they start killing people's internet and arresting "terrorists" for having opposition to America's stance on...well, anything.

Spend the money on tracking down and eliminating the threats, don't spend it on a "oops, we lost the cyber war" back up plan.

 

[jjofearth]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *ahem*

OT: These sound like the kind of people who would think the internet is a tangible thing; they appear scared that a terrorist is going to st3al teh internetz ZOMG!

 

[Hyper-space]

Oh yeah?

Well the US government can suck my cock.

Damn right!

How amazingly self-centred of them... That would disrupt internet commerce the world over!

I'm all for increased levels of security online... but that's just going way too far.

Oh noes! the government can shut down the internet if a full-scale cyber-attack would have occur!

the horror...

But seriously, i think national security is more important that finishing a game of TF2.

Edit:

Surely turning off the internet during a time of crisis would worsen things? Most people rely on electronic news sources these days. I mean for example:

Crisis 1: Terrorists denote an explosive
Internet gets turned off: People assume the internet is broken because the Russopeans/Chapanese/Islamistanis have BLOWN UP THE DATA CENTRES! IT'S AN INVASION! GET YOUR GUN! SHOOT ANYONE IN A UNIFORM!

Crisis 2: A small earthquake
Internet gets turned off: IT'S A SUPERQUAKE! WASHINGTON HAS BEEN DESTROYED! GET YOUR GUN! SHOOT THE GROUND! IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO STOP THE SANDWORMS!

I could go on.

It doesn't help that "Lieberman" really sounds like the name you'd give a Bond villain.

THEY WOULD NOT TURN OF THE INTERNET IF SOME TERRORIST WOULD DETONATE A BOMB.

I get that people like to scream "1984!" every time the government does ANYTHING but this is just bordering on sheer stupidity.

 

[Savagezion]

Oh yeah?

Well the US government can suck my cock.

Exactly! Just when I think the US government is beginning to ease up on media tyranny, they go and do something like this and bring my tick back.

"Those who would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both."

Does this phrase mean absolutley nothing anymore? This is stupid on so many levels. Plus, as has been stated what kind of emergency would this be for?

Just in case the whole our world communication ever needs to be severed? Communication is a positive thing. When communication stops, it is time to worry. When someone is trying to sever communication - never trust their motives. Ever.

 

[Agayek]

HA! Loving the mocking, Mr. Chalk. Cyber-this and Cyber-that

Mr. Government,
[/i]You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means[/i]

OT: Is this just for the US? Cus I'm questioning why they would have any right to turn off British internet, considering A) They HAVE no right and B) We technically invented it

It's just for the US. The bill would require American ISPs/companies/etc to shut down internet traffic when a state of emergency is declared. The US government has no authority over anything else.

That said, it's an incredibly stupid move. All it would do is lock up the entire US infrastructure, and it's unlikely to even stop the real threats. It's not that hard to set up a satellite connection to a proxy in another country and route back into the system through that. It just strikes me as a really dumb move made by people who don't actually understand the system.

 

[Slaanax]

The idea is a good one if you set it up for important government servers so you could cut them off, from the rest of internet. I don't think they need to turn my internet off. What happens if we get invaded by Aliens who can use our Internet Connection to invade our homes!

 

[Savagezion]

fair enough, i think thats quite a good idea

lolwut

 

[manaman]

Why should the us government have the authority over the internet in the first place? It's not like it's theirs.

Exactly.

Portions of it are. The US military is still in control of two of the top level DNS servers, and DARPA a third cluster. That's out of 13 top level clusters.

 

[Agayek]

Oh my good lord. I can see it now, so we'll lose words in our language and they'll be able to listen to us threw our TVs. If anyone gets what I'm referencing I will be surprised.

1984 isn't exactly unheard of...

Besides, everyone loves them some Orwellian dictatorships.

 

[nipsen]

"Oh, no", they say. "Americans are not mad", they say. "You just gotta have faith", they say. "People are dumb everywhere", they say.

And that's fine - but do you have to elect every damned one of them into office?

 

[jackknife402]

This story has already been on the escapist once before I thought....

 

[Fensfield]

As someone else said.. how unbelievably self-centred (given a lot of traffic routes through America to everywhere else).

I wonder how likely it is the rest of the world will respond by centralising their internet assets so that America can't screw over their economies during something they consider an 'incident'.

 

[The Austin]

WHAT!?!??!?

One VERY important part about my Apocalypse survival plans was "Contact fellow survivors on the Escapist"

What am I supposed to do now?
LOOK for fellow survivors? HELL NO!

 

[Lazy Kitty]

Well, they better only shut it down in th US.