U.S. Government Proposes "Internet Kill Switch"

[Danpascooch]

It wouldn't be as impossible as you claim it to be if the major ISP's were forced to have a last resort kill switch. After all, anyone who wants to connect to the internet (don't split hairs, I mean 99.9% of everyone) requires an ISP, without that ISP they cannot connect to the internet. ISP's can shut off a persons internet service if they don't pay their bill, so creating a "switch" that shuts off everyone's (everyone THEY provide internet to anyway) internet service would not be inconceivable.

It's not splitting hairs. That 0.1% of connections that are not through an ISP are exactly the connections that would be used by a foreign cyber-warfare unit that this bill is intended to defend against.

EDIT:

I don't think this is a good idea, but it's not the insanity that everyone claims it to be. I think ISP's should be forced to have kill switches for some sites they provide access to, such as online banking sites and sites holding medical records, could you imagine if somebody found a major vulnerability in a very important internet website?

Maybe those more critial websites could disconnect or filter themselves if neccessary, rather than relying on ISPs to forbid connecting to them?

Filtering at the ISP level would be very easy to defeat using a proxy. And of course would only defend against domestic terrorists/criminals.

The thing about proxies, is that you need to connect to a proxy server using your internet service in order to start using it, if your internet provider cuts off your service at the source, a proxy isn't going to do shit.

And yes, a kill switch would NOT block the attackers, but when it takes banks, records, and civilians offline, who will they attack? There is no way to cut a determined cyber-criminal who knows a security vulnerability off, so the next best thing is to be prepared to isolate them from all of their victims (by kill switch) as a last resort in case of an absolute security disaster.

 

[Danpascooch]

Fuck Liebermen and fuck Obama in short. Isn't this sort of like something Nazis would do, cut off part of the country so that the other part doesn't know that while the Nazis are taking over half the land its planning on doing the other half next.

They didn't cut off or censor anything or claim they would do so, it's a proposal for a last resort security measure.

"Fuck" your liberal use of the "fuck" aimed at Obama who did NOT propose or sign this bill into law. In short "fuck" your ignorance and bigotry, and "fuck" your impolite attacks at a person who is not a party to the action you are complaining about.

Freedom of speech is a ***** but still a freedom (at this point) and I can point my anger and aggression to anyone I feel it is deserved thank you, so again fuck O-B-A-M-A and fuck Y-O-U. =D

P.S. I did not propose that Obama proposed or signed this bill into law, I just hate him as much as I do Lieberman.

Funny you should mention freedom of speech, because you USED that freedom when you spewed the idiotic fallacy that "America loves to take away freedoms" irony much?

Another thing about freedom of speech, it won't protect you from Escapist moderator wrath, the kind of wrath summoned when you say "fuck you" to another user

Lastly, I don't believe for a second you weren't blaming Obama when you posted that, your little "ps" is basically a "Whoops, somebody just proved I have no idea what I'm talking about, better pretend I meant something else"

I don't like cigarettes either, but I didn't enter this thread saying "Screw Lieberman and screw cigarettes!" why? Because that would be stupid and illogical

 

[Stone Wera]

So what? The internet will be down, big deal. We can live without the internet.

 

[Danpascooch]

Why are people acting as if by proposing a last resort, temporary security measure, that Lieberman is trying to destroy the internet, and has already succeeded?

 

[UnusualStranger]

Why are people acting as if by proposing a last resort, temporary security measure, that Lieberman is trying to destroy the internet, and has already succeeded?

The thing about emergency actions that give someone a hell of a lot of power is quite the problem, even if it was simply just proposed.

This is no small matter, as what exactly is accomplished by having a "kill switch" for all the internet? What exactly is saved by shutting it all down?

If we were to come under "cyber attack" what exactly would shutting down the internet do? You can't find your attacker by closing all the doors in your house. When you finally decide to open one again, the attacker will just go through that.


The reason everyone is so up in arms over this sort of thing is that proposing giving someone absolute power over something is not liked at all, because absolute power cannot be questioned.

 

[Mr. McFuzzers]

So the government can really break the internet...great.

 

[Danpascooch]

Why are people acting as if by proposing a last resort, temporary security measure, that Lieberman is trying to destroy the internet, and has already succeeded?

The thing about emergency actions that give someone a hell of a lot of power is quite the problem, even if it was simply just proposed.

This is no small matter, as what exactly is accomplished by having a "kill switch" for all the internet? What exactly is saved by shutting it all down?

If we were to come under "cyber attack" what exactly would shutting down the internet do? You can't find your attacker by closing all the doors in your house. When you finally decide to open one again, the attacker will just go through that.


The reason everyone is so up in arms over this sort of thing is that proposing giving someone absolute power over something is not liked at all, because absolute power cannot be questioned.

Let's say a terrorist groups discovers a major vulnerability in a common website template, and starts stealing information from banks, and government records en masse (this seems like an impossible scenario, but as the internet continues to exist and expand, it's not unreasonable to believe that this may happen at some point down the line), this kill switch could be deployed NOT to FIND the attackers, but to stop them from stealing this information by pulling it off the web, at this point the security hole that allowed the attack could be isolated and repaired, at which point these sites could return to the web.

The reason I'm alright with this is because it can't be used in secret and abused like other measures such as wiretaps, if this kill switch was ever used, nearly every person in America would instantly know what happened when they lost connectivity, and they would demand answers, at that point the people in the government behind flipping the switch would have to provide sound proof that it was necessary, or they would surely be at the end of a major investigation.

In short, there is no potential for abuse barring complete corruption of all of the major courts and branches of the United States government, and I'm not enough of a conspiracy theorist to believe the entire government in all of it's checks and balances could be completely corrupted toward a single end all at the same time. If that ever did happen, it would be revolution time, and at that point there would be far graver concerns than loss of internet access.

 

[Plurralbles]

Wait... so not only do we give the US president power to end the world with the touch of a button and a few coordinates, he can end the virtual world too... Bastards.

This could be used to silence regions. Imagine if there was a mass murder of tons of people by the government and no one could get even a tweet out to tell the world of hte atrocity? And yes, I do think this'll freak some of the whack jobs in the world out. Conspiracy theorists will have a field day with this.

 

[the_god_father_87]

This has got to be one of the most undemocratic law changes to exist in this day and age. The Internet belongs to all of us, not just a select few. Why don't politicians and corporate companies understand what the internet is, or what it stands for? A free public forum of ideas and knowledge. The internet is owned by everyone and no one.

 

[Mr.Pandah]

Why are people acting as if by proposing a last resort, temporary security measure, that Lieberman is trying to destroy the internet, and has already succeeded?

The thing about emergency actions that give someone a hell of a lot of power is quite the problem, even if it was simply just proposed.

This is no small matter, as what exactly is accomplished by having a "kill switch" for all the internet? What exactly is saved by shutting it all down?

If we were to come under "cyber attack" what exactly would shutting down the internet do? You can't find your attacker by closing all the doors in your house. When you finally decide to open one again, the attacker will just go through that.


The reason everyone is so up in arms over this sort of thing is that proposing giving someone absolute power over something is not liked at all, because absolute power cannot be questioned.

Let's say a terrorist groups discovers a major vulnerability in a common website template, and starts stealing information from banks, and government records en masse (this seems like an impossible scenario, but as the internet continues to exist and expand, it's not unreasonable to believe that this may happen at some point down the line), this kill switch could be deployed NOT to FIND the attackers, but to stop them from stealing this information by pulling it off the web, at this point the security hole that allowed the attack could be isolated and repaired, at which point these sites could return to the web.

The reason I'm alright with this is because it can't be used in secret and abused like other measures such as wiretaps, if this kill switch was ever used, nearly every person in America would instantly know what happened when they lost connectivity, and they would demand answers, at that point the people in the government behind flipping the switch would have to provide sound proof that it was necessary, or they would surely be at the end of a major investigation.

In short, there is no potential for abuse barring complete corruption of all of the major courts and branches of the United States government, and I'm not enough of a conspiracy theorist to believe the entire government in all of it's checks and balances could be completely corrupted toward a single end all at the same time. If that ever did happen, it would be revolution time, and at that point there would be far graver concerns than loss of internet access.

Yeah...I wish I could live in your world. Only a few people need to be corrupt. Not everyone. The guy who flips the switch because he doesn't like whats going on in the internet, the guy who is going to "fix" the problem, and then the guy whose going to say "oh yeah, we stopped those terrorists" and make up some bullshit.

Absolute power is not looked upon very kindly.

 

[UnusualStranger]

chopped for length

Such a scenario as you proposed is as likely as aliens hacking into the network to steal information.

Simply finding a way to hack a particular security measure grants you access only to a particular area. You cannot access banks, government, and everything at once. Security simply does not work that way.

However, the problem with your scenario is that no terrorist organization is going to want to hack for information. The biggest threat this would be likely focused on is another nation. Terrorists stealing government information is worthless. Random Terrorist 1 simply would not have the resources to make use of things they could possibly get from the government information system

Also, we come back to a point I made earlier. How can you fix the error if you simply shut down the net? The reason there was an exploit in the first place is because we didn't know about it. By simply shutting down the net, how will we know what to fix?

Finally, a kill switch is far too overreaching to me. It sounds as if rather than try to set up a system of blocks in the internet, they would rather just shut everything off. Thats like taking a nuke to a problem when perhaps all you need is one missile.

 

[Plurralbles]

I can only see two reason's that this would EVER be useful

1. Skynet becomes self-aware

2. The machines become self aware

Basically if machines try and destroy the world.

if it was used strictly for this I wouldn't hav ea problem. But no, you can't rely on the government to use ultimate power wisely. God. Damn. Them.

 

[ryanxm]

i will sooner shoot my self in the foot then let them take away my internet!

 

[Hiroshi Mishima]

I think the very reaction of the general public in this forum is proof of how people will react in general should this be passed and actually acted upon. People will be up in arms, rioting, it'd be mass hysteria. As said chaos escalated (or to prevent it entirely) they would impose curfews and other such regulations and before you know it, we're living The Communist Lifestyle or something similar (pardon me for using incorrect terms occasionally).

While I can agree with there needing to be a preventative or at the very least some sort of counter-measure if there actually WERE some sort of internet-based threat to America or even the world at large, I don't think something like this is the right idea. I mean the chaotic result I described above notwithstanding, it would likely leave the country in economical meltdown and could possibly take other countries with it. As someone else said this could be the very reaction someone attacking over the internet might be after. Because once the defences are down there would be nothing stopping the attacking country from using their "antiquated technology" (since China is supposedly a less developed nation) and catching us with our cyber-pants down. Sorry couldn't resist that little joke.

I do agree that it feels America's government is trying hard to be the World Police, but this has been the state of affairs here in America for a long time now. Honestly, as someone else mentioned, we don't know for a fact that the U.S. government doesn't ALREADY have something like this. Either in development or protected somewhere within the confines of bureaucracy, away from the ever prying eyes of the public, foreign powers, and 4chan. I gotta say that the fact China even HAS a cyber-division (pun unintended that time) makes me wonder why America doesn't. Then I remember things like the Stealth Bomber and such which were being used years before we ever got word of their existence and I thought back to that old saying of... hmmm how does it go?

"Sometimes the best way to hide something is to leave it out in the open."

And to be fair, there's nothing anyone can actually say or do to truly disprove what I just said. Hell I remember some years back they talked about working working with anti-gravity technology, and then I remember seeing footage of a guy who build just such a device (had to tie it down to keep it from getting away) on a small scale in his garage. So yeah, who knows what the American Government already has in play. I don't (not to the full extent) and I doubt any of you guys do either. Those that claim they do would have to back it up with hard decisive proof, and I don't mean links to websites and theories of scientific or academic origin.

 

[Haloperidol]

Out of my way! I have to save teh internetzzz

 

[RicoADF]

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

Well thats the thing, they could only turn off the US internet, so England, Australia etc are all safe from the tyranny of it , until our governments get the idea.... oh crap.

 

[AWDMANOUT]

No.

Doesn't really make any sense. Why would the internet need to be shut off? Stupid.

If it reaches light, it's only because the government wants more power.

 

[v3n0mat3]

I guess it's safe to say that in a time of crisis, the Government will purposefully the whole internet.

 

[Ldude893]

The internet is owned by the world, NOT the United States.
I can see why Joe Lieberman has such a low approval rating, he's a bloody idiot.

 

[Nouw]

The internet does not belong to the U.S government. It is not theres to shut down.

This guy has some sense

Seriously, who gave the US the right to shutdown the internet whenever they wanted to