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United States Government The Internet Your Rights Online

Commerce Secretary: US Wants Multi-Stakeholder Process To Preserve Internet 57

Ted_Margaris_Chicago writes The United States will resist all efforts to give "any person, entity or nation" control of the Internet rather than the "global multi-stakeholder communities," said Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker in a Oct. 13 speech. "Next week, at the International Telecommunication Union Conference in Korea, we will see proposals to put governments in charge of Internet governance. You can rest assured that the United States will oppose these efforts at every turn," she said in prepared remarks to an Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, meeting in Los Angeles.
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Commerce Secretary: US Wants Multi-Stakeholder Process To Preserve Internet

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  • Don't like it? (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by geekoid ( 135745 )

    Build you're own internet.

    • Re:Don't like it? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Actually, I do RTFA ( 1058596 ) on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @07:52PM (#48155353)

      The problem is, they're likely to. If not now, than at some point in the future. There is a great value to a single unified environment.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        There is a great value to a single unified environment.

        Minus those few theocracies, kleptocracies and autocracies that self-inflict there own isolation we already have a single unified environment. How will handing governance over to the Star Wars cantina at the UN — or whatever — improve things?

      • Re:Don't like it? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by epyT-R ( 613989 ) on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @10:18PM (#48156221)

        and why would you want a single unified environment? It's not likely to coincide with your values or expectations. It's likely to be oppressive in order to reach 'compromise' once all the limits imposed by each nation are imposed.

        The borders keep the peace because we are not monocultures.

      • by tqk ( 413719 )

        If not now, than at some point in the future.

        This is different from that. Then is a time different now. This is less than you should, or likely would, need to care about.

        There is a great value to a single unified environment.

        There may be great value in single unified environments. There are great hazards inherent in monoculture environments.

        Some of us care that what we use to communicate ideas is a precision tool which should not be WHACK! WHACK! WHACKed out blindly like you do.

        I'd care a lot more about what you write if you'd care more about making me want to read it.

        One is less than two. Then is o

    • by ihtoit ( 3393327 ) on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @08:20PM (#48155517)

      Build you're own internet.

      Fine! I will! With blackjack, and hookers!

    • by antdude ( 79039 )

      Build you are own Internet? :P

    • Build you're own internet.

      Just like you programmed your own grammar checker? ;-)

    • Build you're own internet.

      Now we're talking stakeholders.

      Build your own Internet. This one's already been claimed by stakeholders. Isn't that what they called in the Gold Rush -- staking a claim?

      Gather a big financial package and give stuff away to change the direction of traffic in your favor. Don't appear to be evil, but only long enough to command big fees for wasting attention and hijacking browsers.

      It is odd that Secretary Pritzger struts with the Internet overseas at a time when stateside the Federal Communications Commission

  • by fustakrakich ( 1673220 ) on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @07:54PM (#48155359) Journal

    Let's see how the practice turns out. Part of a "free, open" internet is making sure that no one can monopolize the pipe. Government isn't the only evil here. There is plenty of private interest in balkanization. In fact most government regulation is for their benefit.

    • There is plenty of private interest in balkanization.

      OTOH, it still holds true that all problems in computer science can be solved by another level of indirection.

  • by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @07:55PM (#48155365)

    ... or keep. The internet is a network of networks. Any country only controls the parts on its own soil.

    • by gl4ss ( 559668 )

      well, not quite. any country can to a point control how other parts seem when viewed from their land.

      however, it seems that US supporting multi stake is more like US opposing a new more level multi stake arrangement through some other entitity(un is a multi stake entity for example). US would rather that all the stakes are US stakes..

    • by Rakarra ( 112805 )

      It seems like most of the time news stories talk about "control over The Internet," they're talking about one of three things:
      1) Control over DNS, specifically who gets .com and other tlds.
      2) The ability to knock a site they don't like offline so no one can use it.
      3) Strong surveillance over all traffic that (usually) crosses their borders or is entirely within those borders.

  • We are fsk'd (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by Bodhammer ( 559311 )
    With this administration - " the United States will oppose these efforts at every turn" , means just the opposite and we are totally fucked...
    • Re:We are fsk'd (Score:5, Insightful)

      by RightwingNutjob ( 1302813 ) on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @10:13PM (#48156195)
      Considering W made it a point to keep ICANN's governance under the commerce department (censorship by which is banned by the US constitution) and Obama gave it away in a grand gesture of appeasement, you're pretty spot on.
      • But W also used the influence the commerce department has to block the .xxx domain name for political reasons, because the social conservatives were afraid it would legitimise pornography and make it more difficult to ban. .xxx is still a stupid idea, but not for that reason.

        • Difference being that stuff like that can and does change with administrations, but more importantly, is fairly transparent. It's not like you come in to work one morning to your job at wecriticizegovernmentalstupidityforaliving.com and ...what office? what website? It's always been a shuttered building. What boss? What lead reporter? Oh you must be talking about prisoner 24601.
          • It changes both ways, and that's just the bit we are aware of. Who knows what's going on behind the scenes. Remember ACTA? Negotiated in secret - the public only became aware of it via leaked documents, and this was a legal agreement with potentially more of an effect than an act of congress. Now TRIPS is being negotiated in exactly the same manner. The idea of conspiracies of politicians secretly running the country may sound like the stuff of conspiracy theories, but every now and then it's exactly what h

            • Nowhere in the constitution does it say that treaties can override rights. It's a court challenge waiting to happen. Also, treaties generally aren't voted on in secret, even if they're negotiated that way. In fact, I don't believe congress can legally vote in secret on anything. They can have classified meetings, but they can't pass secret laws.
              • The vote may be public - but it's also potentially quick. There's an easy political trick that can be used with treaties or laws alike: Speed. Write in secret, negotiate in secret, then rush through the vote as fast as you can. The PATRIOT act, for example, was introduced on October 23 - and passed by the house on the 24th. If the trick is executed properly, any opposition groups just don't have time to rally. By the time they are aware of what's going on, it's already too late.

                Also, under the Supremacy Cla

  • so far, just smoke with a cracked mirror
  • by grilled-cheese ( 889107 ) on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @08:12PM (#48155465)
    So how many of these countries have already sharded the internet behind their government firewalls, i.e. China/Russia? And we believe that all other governments are less corrupt and self serving than the US? I'm not a fan of the US Panopticon and stranglehold on critical infrastructure, but honestly, it's worked for several decades now why break it up? At least the US influence that conforms with the military influence we already have. It would be great if a multinational panacea existed to control it, but the closest thing we have to that today is the UN. It doesn't have a strong track record for being the most effective governing body out there. Corruption and government go hand-in-hand; one feeds the other.
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      what makes you think the US hasn't done it too?

      perhaps someone out there can technically prove to me that absolutely no foreign IPs are blocked by our US government, but aside from that, I am inclined to believe that mucky-mucks in the current (and past) administration actively block certain content.

      and yes, my tin-foil hat is firmly in place.

  • Continued United States government control
    over the Internet is the worst possible scenario,
    EXCEPT FOR ALL THE OTHERS.

    (Apologies to Winston Churchill)

  • by DaMattster ( 977781 ) on Wednesday October 15, 2014 @10:36PM (#48156285)
    This is a bad idea because the stakeholders have the monetary wealth to exert influence over the internet and thus causing even more problems. It must remain regulated by a neutral, objective third party that cannot be co-opted by money, power, or influence - or, at least, not any more than it already has.
  • others (Score:1, Troll)

    by Tom ( 822 )

    The United States will resist all efforts to give "any person, entity or nation"

    other than the US, that is. Because we think our laws are applicable world-wide, our jurisdiction covers Earth and we invented the damn thing (ignore that this is only partially true) so get on your knees and thank us.

    • by Max_W ( 812974 )
      You are right. But there is also a good reason in the Commerce Secretary's position.
  • "The United States will resist all efforts to give "any person, entity or nation" control of the Internet"

    Unless the Holy Copyright or Holy Patents are at stake of course. Then the US will (ab)use all its power to force their wiew down everyone's throat.

FORTRAN is not a flower but a weed -- it is hardy, occasionally blooms, and grows in every computer. -- A.J. Perlis

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