U.S. Government Proposes "Internet Kill Switch"

[Atmos Duality]

In my opinion, this is simply a power grab, america is attempting to assert its authority over that which has no hierachy of command (the internet). This is a underhanded insulting move by the Americans, attempting to make a kill switch for the internet that would cripple businesses around the world, if this bill passed, the americans could effectively take over the world, simply threatening to turn off the internet and destroy a nations economiy if it disagreed with them.

This measure as proposed threatens Americans as much as it does the rest of the world.
Economies aren't one-way relationships; the rest of the world could very easily cut our businesses out in protest.
Think a bit before you pin it on all Americans; because you can bet your ass I'm protesting this.

 

[Legion3321]

In my opinion, this is simply a power grab, america is attempting to assert its authority over that which has no hierachy of command (the internet). This is a underhanded insulting move by the Americans, attempting to make a kill switch for the internet that would cripple businesses around the world, if this bill passed, the americans could effectively take over the world, simply threatening to turn off the internet and destroy a nations economiy if it disagreed with them.

This measure as proposed threatens Americans as much as it does the rest of the world.
Economies aren't one-way relationships; the rest of the world could very easily cut our businesses out in protest.
Think a bit before you pin it on all Americans; because you can bet your ass I'm protesting this.

Well i am in a way pinning it all on Americans, since anything that happens to America will somehow affect another country elsewhere. Although i agree that an outside Nation could cripple Americas economy, they would not only be doing so to America, they would do so to every economy everywhere.

But my point was that this kill-switch could be changed to affect singular countries and not the Planet as a whole. Therefore it could be used as a weapon forcing others into submission.
Once again, i will say its past midnight and im very very tired.

 

[burninglondon]

Problem: Cyber (can we please retire this overused word?) security around some government databases is not as good as it could be.

Solution: Shut down the entire internet?

This is a lot like saying, "We're getting a lot of prank phone calls, so we decided to tear out the city's phone lines and cell towers rather than, say, screening our calls or getting a new phone number."

 

[AvsJoe]

*shivers*

Well, way to go Joe Lieberman. I defended you for so long in political discussions and this is how you repay me? Congrats dude, you lost a supporter. I hope you rot in a special sauna built just for you somewhere near the bottom of Hell.

 

[Bobzer77]

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.

It would disrupt internet commerce the world over but it would cripple any internet business in the U.S. The moment they try this they are going to see businesses fleeing their country like rats on a sinking boat.

Is America still calling itself a democracy? Because from what I've seen it's more of an electoral dictatorship....

 

[AnAngryMoose]

I think the US government is slipping into a state of paranoia by the sounds of things...

 

[ShadowKatt]

Alright, I'm going to weigh in on this. The proposed legislation says that it will "compel" ISP and communication service providers to comply with the internet kill switch. What that is is basicly newspeak for "Take over". By saying that companys like AT&T and Verizon refused to comply, the government will use its authority to remove the heads of the company and control all communications across the nation. It would be another step towards the end of all first ammendment rights in this country, as well as several others as they could monitor communication worldwide.

 

[AnneSQF]

Can't the US government have their own internet free from cyber-hackers and cyber-terrorists? I don't want anyone to be able to kill the cyber-internet. And someone I can't even vote on. Only Americans can do that. Shouldn't this be a UN thing?

 

[Atmos Duality]

Shouldn't this be a UN thing?

If the UN had even an ounce of worth, then this kill-switch issue wouldn't even exist as a global threat.
I'm hoping that Congress sees this as the security and ethical breach that it is, and shoots it down.

Then again, we did get the Patriot Act from these assclowns..

 

[Bloodstain]

Way to screw with the economy.

Good thing I don't live in the U.S.

 

[ahappycamper]

I see the importance of protecting our cyber-resources but I am cyber concerned about what effect of all this internet policing will have on our day-to-day internet usage, I'm worried that all this security and policing will reduce out cyber-freedom and negatively affect the amazing creativity of the internet. If every company is looking over their shoulders every time they do anything remotely surprising or risque' then the internet will start looking more and more like the local library. OOh take your shoes off and make sure you don't disturb other users.

Why does the U.S. government get a huge stiffy every time that they think of a new way to reduce our freedom and increase their totalitarian control?

 

[Darks63]

Joe Lieberman once again proving he is a idiot.

 

[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.

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.

And you think the American people would buy bullshit in such an extreme scenario? I have a little more faith than that in our citizens.

 

[cjbos81]

Why does everyone have a problem with this proposed law.

Habeas corpus was suspended during the civil war.

All air travel was shut down following 9/11.

The internet is actually under threat from anti-western entities, including china, russia, north korea, and various rogue nations throughout the middle east.

All of our electrical grids, and other resource delivery systems are in fact accessible via remote computer networks.

The most common opinion of the people commenting here seems to be this notion that the "evil American government is going to shut down the internet because they're evil and they want to kill us all for oil" or whatever the hell most anarchists think.

If our critical systems are under legitimate enemy attack, I want them to have the legal authority to take action. I'm not worried. I exist outside of the internet. "oh no the internet is shut down to protect of municipal water systems. Oh no. How will I watch my youtubes. [single gunshot] head slumps against desk."

 

[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.

And you think the American people would buy bullshit in such an extreme scenario? I have a little more faith than that in our citizens.

Yes, yes I do. For the same reason a lot of people out there believe that 9/11 happened because of government conspiracy. Or that Bush didn't help victims of Katrina because he just didn't tell anyone about it (when he clearly told the governor and mayors to get everyone out asap). And a whole ton of other bullshit. Frankly, my faith in our citizens has waned extremely.

 

[cjbos81]

Problem: Cyber (can we please retire this overused word?) security around some government databases is not as good as it could be.

Solution: Shut down the entire internet?

This is a lot like saying, "We're getting a lot of prank phone calls, so we decided to tear out the city's phone lines and cell towers rather than, say, screening our calls or getting a new phone number."

Way to screw with the economy.

Good thing I don't live in the U.S.

I'm pretty sure the "shutting down" of the internet would actuall be a series of measures for extreme and temporay circumstances. Like after 9/11. As we can see, air travel has since resumed. Besides which, most business still occurs outside of the internet. If the system is temporarily affected by governmemt action, it will be alot better than some terrorist attack that completely destroys those very systems.

 

[Ashendarei]

the problem with giving any group or persons power, is that they'll feel tempted to use it. I don't think there's much they could use it for that would provide an appropriate benifit worth the cost of interrupting service to millions of users.

 

[All_Aces]

Let me get this straight. We're giving control of the world's largest platform of free speech to a corrupt minority of people who can deactivate it at a whim deemed "terrorism?"

What could POSSIBLY go wrong?

 

[Anticitizen_Two]

Tsk, tsk... Don't they know that turning off the Internet means the terrorists have won?