U.S. Government Proposes "Internet Kill Switch"

[HeySeansOnline]

Ok, I'm going to start training carrier pidgeons, lets see the man shut those down.

 

[Mr. Grey]

I could have sworn Lieberman was an Independent Democrat. So wouldn't he be left wing? Or is that the problem? I haven't paid much attention with politics, they've increasingly made me jaded and depressed.

He lost the Democratic primary here in Connecticut and started his own party (it has since repudiated him - which has got to hurt since it had his name in its title). He supposedly caucuses with Democrats but campaigned for McCain and can always be relied upon to support knee-jerk conservative responses (both regarding national security and "morals").

Fortunately, his chances of being reelected at this point are about the same as BP being named the this year's most environmentally friendly corporation.

Oh, Lieberman! What zany right-wing paranoid fear-mongering will you bring us next? And, more importantly, what civil liberties crushing solution will you propose?

Gut miranda rights? Check. Deny accused criminals other basic rights? Check. Pave the way for a government seizure of the internet? Check.

I could have sworn Lieberman was an Independent Democrat. So wouldn't he be left wing? Or is that the problem? I haven't paid much attention with politics, they've increasingly made me jaded and depressed.

He's whatever the lobbyists want him to be...

So he's basically That Guy. I don't even want to know how long he's been in office, it's bad enough Michele Bachmann is in there.

All politicians are That Guy. All successful politicians, that is.

True enough, but I think this guy is a terminal case of it.

What remains to be seen is if this is a last ditch effort not to get flushed out of congress with the rest of the incumbents.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

"As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."

-- Commissioner Pravin Lal, "U.N. Declaration of Rights" - The Planetary Datalinks

 

[Valkyira]

I like the term 'Cyber-Warriors', it makes me picture a dude hitting the internet with a stick.

OT: What gives President of the United States the right to turn off something that would affect the entire world?

 

[luckshot]

yeah...no

ive been trying to put together a series of events and catastrophes that shutting off the internet would help...and it just doesnt work

shutting down a core communication network for civilians (dont know if they would shut their internet off too) seems like it would only cripple the nation further during said crisis and people would be more apt to panic

and who decides what kind of crisis warrants such measures, the potential for abuse is high

Ok, I'm going to start training carrier pidgeons, lets see the man shut those down.

they might not shut them down but they may shoot them down

 

[spinFX]

Joe Lieberman is an ignorant corporatist douche bag. Fuck him and anything he suggests.

 

[JayDub147]

Destroy our internet? We must respond with our most powerful weapon! CALL IN 4CHAN

Actually, with all the crazy shit they do, 4chan is probably getting used as justification for this bill...

 

[Tinneh]

Cyber 9/11? Am I terrible because I found that quite funny?

Terrible idea. Why should America choose when the entirety of the internet goes down?

I find it hilarious, albeit a fucking stupid idea. Ah well, Ireland for the win!

 

[Kollega]

On 6 August 1991, CERN, a pan European organization for particle research, publicized the new World Wide Web project. The Web was invented by British scientist Tim Berners-Lee in 1989. An early popular web browser was ViolaWWW, patterned after HyperCard and built using the X Window System. It was eventually replaced in popularity by the Mosaic web browser. In 1993, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois released version 1.0 of Mosaic, and by late 1994 there was growing public interest in the previously academic, technical Internet. By 1996 usage of the word Internet had become commonplace, and consequently, so had its use as a synecdoche in reference to the World Wide Web.

So the APRAnet, or whatever "prototype" there was, dosen't count. Okay then.

I just think to myself regulary - "what's with British inventing and creating absolutely everything in human history from United States to paperclips?"

 

[Wandrecanada]

Between this and Mr. Tubes the Government looks more and more out of touch with current technology than it's citizens. They have plenty of lawyers and econmics grads kicking around the government but when are they going to start hiring some people who have training in the rest of reality?

 

[Eldritch Warlord]

This is cyber-madness! If we go down this cyber-path it will surely lead to cyber-fascism!

Cyber Brother is watching.

 

[Nikolaz72]

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.

Yea the internet is in an anarchist state right now and i would perhaps like some increased security. But giving USA the power to shut down all internet in every corner of the world? It has been proven that if you have control of the internet you have control of the world so if we want to live in peace we should probably have it remain as nobodys and everybody's business.

 

[FungiGamer]

I'm betting this entire bill is a terrorist plot to paralyze not only the U.S. but all other countries as well, THE WORD MUST GET OUT!!!

 

[bojac6]

Ten seconds of the USA with no internet would cripple the world economy. How many US firms use the internet to trade in international stock markets? How many international firms trade on the NYSE? How about the major corporations that just do microtransactions a thousand times a day? And that's just considering what it would do to the stock market.

Think of what it would do to eBay, iTunes, Google, Amazon, etc. How much money per second does Amazon make? Seriously, the stat is something like 50 items sold a second on Amazon alone.

This is just monetary affects. What about hospitals that use teleconferencing and internet based patient monitoring? There are pacemakers out there right now that report heart attacks automatically (though that might be cellular networks). What about services like OnStar that work through the internet infrastructure? Now we're no longer just talking about the trillions of dollars lost in a few seconds of no internet, we're talking about lives lost.

 

[Dexiro]

I just can't think of why that would ever be necessary.

 

[TheTurtleMan]

Well first off I want to point out that it was just one senator that proposed this and not the entire US government so you might want to save the anti-American rage for later kids.

This proposition might have something to do with a possible "breach" in private government documents by means of wikileaks. It could be unrelated or just a coincidence but here's the link in case you want to check it out.

URL=[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/coleen-rowley/wikileak-case-echoes-pent_b_613705.htmlurl]

 

[ShoopDaToaster]

Dang right it is.

 

[brunt32]

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

I don't think you understand what it's saying, They can't shut down the 'internet' but will shut off all the hosting which is owned within the US.
Also probably shutting down all US Isp, But for all of us Non-US we can still access the internet just not US stuff. Which isnt alot.

 

[ShoopDaToaster]

Destroy our internet? We must respond with our most powerful weapon! CALL IN 4CHAN

You called?

 

[Moriarty70]

Wait.... What? A kill switch? Would there be warning beforehand or would we just be told "We're Turning off your Internetz! HA!"

Actually, part of me hopes they don't give out a warning, like if someone is watching a *Ahem* certain Genre of video and just as it actually starts doing what *ahem* it promises... BOOM! You have no internet!

Calumon: I hope this doesn't catch on.

First and foremost, that's why you always have at least one standby burried on the drive somewhere.

Secondly, this would kill access to all the sites that file out of the US to other countries as well. In other words, not only will you not be able to access a sizable group of sites, but when you try to go to CNN to find out why, no luck there either.