[Chapter-delegates] Digital sovreignty and splinternet

[Richard Hill]

I refer to this post which was recently brought to our attention:

 

https://www.internetsociety.org/action-plan/2022/digital-sovereignty/ 

 

I'm puzzled by this bit: "The Internet is borderless by design."

 

All telecommunications are designed to facilitate cross-border
communications flows. In fact, the ITU was created in 1865 precisely to
facilitate the cross-border flow of telegrams, and subsequently facilitated
the cross-border flow of other forms of telecommunication.

 

While base telecommunication protocols (e.g. TCP/IP) are indeed designed to
be borderless, the physical facilities that implement the protocols, and
that provide services based on the protocols, are subject to national law,
for example criminal law, copyright law, etc. (Recall that offline law
applies equally online.)

 

In addition, there may be telecommunications-specific regulation.
Traditionally, those were heavy, and, in many jurisdictions, provided that
only state-owned or authorized monopolies could provide certain services.

 

That ended in the 1980's, with the introduction of liberalization and
privatization.  But certain specific laws still exist. For example, in the
US, CDA 230 creates a liability regime for certain Internet services that is
specific to the Internet.

 

Names and addresses were traditionally assigned on a national basis, and
this was carried over in the domain name system in the form of the ccTLDs.
However, in keeping with the tenets of privatization, most ccTLDs are not
state-owned, and in keeping with the tenets of deregulation, many ccTLDs are
not regulated.

 

IP addresses are handled differently: they are assigned on a regional basis.

 

And Internet routing is not based on national borders. 

 

Here is a more detailed discussion:

 

  http://www.apig.ch/Internet%203-characteristics.doc 

 

But the most important difference regarding the Internet is its funding
model for many services: monetization of personal data through targeted
advertising. This has had some unwanted side-effects, see for example:

 

http://boundary2.org/2015/04/08/the-internet-vs-democracy/ 

 

 
http://www.boundary2.org/2018/02/richard-hill-knots-of-statelike-power-revie
w-of-harcourt-exposed-desire-and-disobedience-in-the-digital-age/ 

 

 
http://www.boundary2.org/2018/10/richard-hill-too-big-to-be-review-of-wu-the
-curse-of-bigness-antitrust-in-the-new-gilded-age/ 

 

 
http://www.boundary2.org/2021/04/richard-hill-the-curse-of-concentration-rev
iew-of-cory-doctorow-how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism/ 

 

Since the Internet now underpins most aspects of our lives and economic
activities, it seems to me inevitable that governments will evaluate whether
they should be more involved in its governance (e.g. by enacting data
privacy laws, and/or by enforcing anti-trust law). 

 

Obviously there is a risk (and not just in non-democratic states) that
government intervention could have unwanted side-effects. So it seems to me
that it is important to provide information to governments that will enable
them to make sensible decisions.

 

Regarding the specific issue of splintering, I fear that it's not just the
Internet that might splinter, but the world as a whole. I fear that we are
moving to a new version of the Cold War which some of us are old enough to
have lived through. 

 

Best,

Richard

 

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/private/chapter-delegates/attachments/20220526/f70a1475/attachment.htm>