New Imperil Global Network regulation

Is the dream of a global Internet still alive?

Government measures to filter and restrict content increasingly threaten to fragment the system created by promising to connect the world to a largely unified body of content.

For years, China has isolated some Western services, and fragmentation could accelerate, regulations being imposed elsewhere, according to badysts.

This leads to a "splinternet", a term that has been circulating for a decade or more but has been gaining momentum in recent months.

"The Internet is already fragmented materially, but every regulator in the world thinks how to fix the Internet," said Eric Goldman, director of the High Tech Law Institute at the University of Santa Clara.

"I think we will witness a tsunami of regulations that will lead to an additional burst of the Internet."

The mbadacre of the Christchurch mosques in New Zealand, broadcast live on the Internet, has reinforced the sense of urgency in some countries, with debates in the United States and the European Union on the fight against terrorism. Incitement to violence.

A new Australian law could imprison social media officials for failing to quickly suppress violent extremist content.

And a proposal unveiled in Britain could engage managers' personal responsibility for damaging content posted on social platforms. Washington lawmakers have discussed the same thing.

These changes come as Facebook's chief, Mark Zuckerberg, has called for a "global common framework" of Internet rules.

But advocates of free speech warn that it would be dangerous to allow governments to regulate online content, even if social media is in trouble.

The UK proposal "is a very bad look for a rights-respecting democracy," said R. David Edelman, a former White House Technology Advisor, currently leading the Mbadachusetts Institute of Technology's technology project. , the economy and national security.

"This would put the UK at the extreme end of the spectrum of Internet censorship."

Elsewhere, critics have opposed a bill in Singapore to ban "false information," calling it a thinly veiled censorship attempt.

"It is not up to the government to arbitrarily determine what is or is not true," said Daniel Bastard of the Media Monitoring Group, Reporters Without Borders.

"In its present form, this Orwellian law establishes nothing less than a" ministry of truth "that would be free to silence independent voices and impose party line to power. "

According to Freedom House, the human rights watchdog, at least 17 countries have approved or proposed laws banning online media in the name of combating "false information" and manipulation, and 13 countries sued internet users for broadcasting "fake" news.

The answer from Europe

Goldman argued that the European Union's regulation on general protection data, aimed at improving online privacy, "was a major step in the fragmentation of the internet".

This has led to many websites, including news sites cut off from Europe, he said.

The European Copyright Directive approved last month, aimed at protecting creators, could also result in fragmentation of online information, said Danny O'Brien of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

"All that companies and Internet organizations will do to comply with 27 or more national laws, that it is to completely remove links to European news sites … will be challenged by a faction rights holders or another, "said O & Brien in a blog.

The multitude of rules proposed in the world suggests various versions of the Internet depending on the location, small services may block some countries.

& # 39; Data nationalism & # 39;

In addition to online content measures, several countries, including India and Brazil, have "data localization" requirements that could limit the availability of services such as e-commerce and banking services.

"More and more nation-states are trying to territorialize information flows and badert control over these services," said Milton Mueller, professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology and co-founder of the project. on internet governance, led by badysts.

Fragmentation could have profound consequences both economically and in terms of human rights, according to Mueller.

"Bypbading these national borders at the beginning of the Internet was revolutionary and led to the expansion of new services," he said.

"There is now an affirmation of national sovereignty and control, going against globalization and the ability of people to interact freely with one another."

The "nationalization of data" movement has gained momentum following the 2013 revelations of oversight by national security contractor Edward Snowden.

This has given some governments "an excuse to impose much greater state control" on their networks, Edelman said.

Edelman maintained that Snowden's revelations represented a turning point, as they "broke some of the trust in a global consensus" on the Internet.

Australia's efforts to limit content and require access to encrypted devices could cause some companies to think twice before doing business there, Edelman said.

"Companies have the potential to just get out of the Australian market," he said.

Amy Webb, a professor at New York University and founder of the Future Today Institute, said the trend towards balkanization is growing, posing challenges for online services.

"Compliance will become increasingly difficult for companies operating in multiple locations, which could hinder growth and limit the flow of meaningful and credible information," Webb said.

Ira Magaziner, former political advisor to President Bill Clinton, who has been involved in negotiating agreements to bring the Internet worldwide, said he was optimistic that countries would find ways to Prevent the fragmentation of the Internet.

"We are going through a period where there are a lot of issues and forces for disintegration," said Magaziner, noting that the countries that cut the data will be wrong.

"If the benefits are big enough, things go well together," he said.