Internet Governance and Governments

April 14

Today we revisit a topic that began in the first class day and has run throughout: who should control the Internet, and how. Three different powers have come to fill that role at the largest levels: governments, corporations, and multistakeholder organizations. Each will invariably have some role to play in how the Internet is run at various levels, but what is the right balance of power? What calibration of powers is most beneficial to the general public? Is one type of power more dangerous than another? Are there examples we can draw from other areas of complex governance to help us develop a plan for governance of the Internet? And what would be the harm if there were no controlling parties at all?

Leading the conversation today will be our own Ryan Budish.

Readings

• The Global Multistakeholder Meeting on the Future of Internet Governance in 'Multistakeholder as Governance Groups: Observations from Case Studies' (case study on p. 214-237)

• NETmundial, Wikipedia

• Explained: The IANA Transition

• Milton Mueller and Brenden Kuerbis, Roadmap for globalizing IANA: Four principles and a proposal for reform

• Jonathan Zittrain and L. Gordon Crovitz Debate the Future of Internet Governance

Optional Readings

• NETmundial Output Document and Principles

Class Discussion

Please remember to sign your postings by adding four tildes (~~~~) to the end of your contribution. This will automatically add your username and the date/time of your post, like so: Andy 15:12, 7 November 2013 (EST)

Hey class, I just read this op-ed by David Brooks on his stance on cop-cams. Though he's ultimately for cop cams he makes an eloquent case for privacy and the harms that could come from arming police with cameras. I thought it was a nice compliment to our own discussions around online privacy. Take a look --> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/14/opinion/david-brooks-the-lost-language-of-privacy.html

Kelly.wilson (talk) 09:49, 14 April 2015 (EDT)

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Conversation about who controls the Internet - mainly governments or corporations - in the United States is extremely challenging in its own right, but when the discussion extends globally, we have a real mess on our hands. Different countries have such a vast range of the concept of censorship, and therefor both policy and legislation differ dramatically on the global scale. The various mentions of China versus California state law in the Zittrain and Crovitz debate caught my attention because of my own experience with the country and the state of California. I first studied China during economics and business courses in my undergrad while living in California. At the time I became a huge proponent of privatization and of course corporate control (better, faster, cheaper! competition!). I decided to go to China when I graduated expecting to hate it after studying it, but I really enjoyed myself. Despite the phenomenal government, economic, and humanitarian issues in China… the country was in a much better position that I expected. And having since visited, I have made friends with a few girls who grew up in China. Despite the very obvious censorship that we are aware of and I saw myself - from television to newspapers to Internet - the people I met have a surprisingly accurate view of their government and the world. The Internet and digital communication are the main sources of up to date and uncolored information in countries whose government policies favor censorship. One of the points that really resonated with me in this video we watched was that American values are being spread through the Internet to countries that do not have them. The fact that ICANN can have a global reach and still follow California state law supports that. Now that ICANN has moved into international control, the debate against this organization pushing US imperialism will subside. I believe that we are moving in the right direction, with walls of censorship being taken down even in Russia, Iran, and India, specifically on the Internet. Ultimately, however, the two main problems going forward as I see them are that ICANN platforms presented by individual countries (outside of the United States) will reflect their government policy, which does not always reflect the best interest of their people and that whatever agreements are made within ICANN (such as Internet Bill of Rights) will be difficult to enforce, especially in sophisticated and wealthy authoritarian governments. Batjarks (talk) 12:57, 14 April 2015 (EDT)

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I actually found this week´s reading quite difficult to understand, so I´m looking forward to class. It was a lot of technical talk that was hard to grasp, for example exactly what the possible solutions are, even though I understood parts of it.

What I perceived was that the U.S. has power over ICANN (until this fall) and that it is problematic, since the Internet should be independent from any specific government.

I also begun to reflect about lobbyists and their power over the Internet. We´ve seen how lobbying earlier have been successful in other issues about the Internet, such as net neutrality. I wonder how powerful lobbyists are when it comes to these matters? The following quote about the meeting in Brazil is interesting since it also is about giving/not giving power to different groups: ”Other efforts were also made to treat contributions from a diverse range of stakeholders equitably. There were four microphones, labeled with construction paper and color-coded for governments, corporations, academics, and advocacy groups”.

That sounds fair, since the labeling of the microphones makes it difficult to hide where your interest are. However, there is always someone setting the agenda for the meeting and deciding who is welcome and not (in this case the smaller Executive Multistakeholder Committee). That someone (a person or a group, in this case a group) has consequently a lot of power. There are always informal power structures at meetings, which affect who is listened to. We sometimes think about the Internet as a free space, independent from governments and the market and without anyone who really governs it. In reality, that is not the case. The Internet is in many ways affected by powerful groups, both formally and informally.

JosefinS (talk) 13:16, 14 April 2015 (EDT)

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Today’s readings and especially the debate between Jonathan Zittrain and Gordon Crovitz, were very useful in order to answer myself what part of Internet is actually controlled and what impact this control has over the Internet final users.

I also asked myself the same question, many people are asking, should it continue the same way and in what direction things need to be changed and see diferent points of view on this. Gordon Crovittz says that he sees more potential problems than positive results if US government gives up the control over ICANN in order to have multi governments control but the reality is that many other countries wants to have their part in it. A very nice explanation of the actual influence of the US government has been given by Milton Mueller and Brenden Kuerbis which answers the question why IANA is actually subject to U.S. jurisdiction and provides America with greater political influence over ICANN.

Events like the NETmundial are a sign that many governments have already realized the importance and power of the Internet governance and feel they have been “left behind”. This is the reason international conferences and initiatives like NETmundial, have been organized. But we are still talking about the influence over ICANN, meaning over he domain names, in certain way. The position Jonathan Zittrain is defending, saying that we should not forget domain names do not equal Internet and actually ICANN is not the one who is deciding what is going to happen in the Internet generally, should be taken into account. The fact that this organization is having authority over the domain names but not over the content or the application of the net neutrality, should not be neglected. I agree that the conditions under which mass surveillance may be permitted, as well as the role of the search engines, which stayed out of the final text of the NETmundial’s final document, seems to be far more crucial than the management and the control over the domain names. In order to establish a new order in the Internet governance many players and interests will be mixed up. The fact that the requirement for the Internet search companies to establish local data centers, was not included in the Brazilian Civil Rights Framework for the Internet as originally envisioned, due to effective lobbying by Internet companies, shows us that a many long and difficult battles are going to be led. (Gia (talk))

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Indeed, from what others on the forum are posting, this was a short reading list but not one to speed through for non-techies… Zittrain’s article on New Republic discussing ICANN put it so well in summing up the rudderless discussion about the great “unowned technology” that is the Internet: it’s confusing. There’s “[n]othing to see here, but Internet governance matters, so go on and get involved.” But for the less optimistic advocates of human nature, for a voice to say there’s nothing to see instantly means something is hiding – and in this case, somewhere in the great and tangled mass that is domain names, ISPs, owned and unowned technologies, and a baffling array of systems that the layman grows cross-eyed trying to understand.

Ultimately, given a choice, this latest move to put everything in the hands of ICANN doesn’t to my layman’s eyes, seem outright egregious… given the two evils I’d rather have a corporation, motivated by success and money, to maintain these kinds of controls instead of the State, operating in bureaucratic stasis and power-intrigues. I found Zittrain’s article, if not a little uncomfortably flippant about potential threats that the March 14 handover has brought about, overall very illuminating. “The Internet is a collective hallucination, one of the best humanity has ever generated.” Only this hallucination is confusingly real. And hallucinations are only “owned” by the eyes of the beholder – in turn, perhaps this principle applies to these policy “decisions” made by various states over a (mostly) stateless entity.

Chanel Rion (talk) 14:16, 14 April 2015 (EDT)

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I’m going to start off by giving some of my personal thoughts on the issue of “who should control the internet”. I believe this fundamental issue could be traced to the regime we have, the basic “rights” that we instilled into our population. (assuming its all about US) Lets start off by looking at who controls the flow of information. Without the internet, it appears to me that information is mostly controlled by the government. I mean, we do see the general public transferring information around, but they are restricted by their geographical location. Even with the creation of telegrams and telephones, the reliability of long distance information transfer was still minimal, and this transfer of information was pricy, as well as the target audience would likely be the recipient that the caller knows.

The next form of communication prior to the internet was news agencies. They would spread the information of recent happenings in the form of newspapers. It is a more efficient means of transferring information, but that too is dependent on the source they have. For example, a news agency’s news is only as accurate as the information they get, and where they get it. If their source does not release any information, then they get nothing. These sources would consider twice before releasing sensitive material, as the information releasing market isn’t very efficient, it would be easier to trace who did it; thus it’s easier for the government to pinpoint the traitor (if necessary).

So if you ask me who controls information prior to the internet? I believe it is the government. Or at least a big chunk of it would be controlled by the government. The government dictates laws and regulations on news corporations. The limitations of information transfer due to technology meant that the small players (individual citizens) were taken out of the equation to have the “power” to control data flow. The real “meat” of the information we “hope” to be transparent was under the control of the government, and the government has their control over what gets released. If a traitor plans to release data, I believe the efficiency of it would be very low, and it would be easy to trace this individual, thus preventing potential traitors.

We need not look too far away. Edward Snowden was a classic example of something that would only happen with the invention of the internet. Without the internet, he would need to think twice before releasing information. Furthermore, the news agency that he would have leaked it to, would also think twice before releasing it. So it makes it more difficult to do this. With the internet, it was simply a click of the button, and everyone would be public.

I like the idea of NetMundial Initiative. (Ref 1) The internet has boomed and developed so quickly that regulations could not go at the same pace. There is no universal governing of the internet. This sort of rings a bell about currencies. That too has no world central bank or something, and thus we always see these violent and volatile movements in the forex market. I believe that the internet is similar as that. It needs some sort of universal regulation or standard to unify things. Though ofcourse it does not always satisfy all parties during the meeting.

Even though NetMundial was a good thing to do, it was going to be hard to make all parties agree with each other’s philosophies. The issue on net neutrality was not addressed either. It went from supporting it, to saying it requires more discussion. (Ref 3) I believe net neutrality will always be a tricky one. It’s hard to agree on this entirely. It also depends deeply on the regime of that country and their core fundamental beliefs. For example, America has very different beliefs than China does. America is a democracy after all with constitutional beliefs for freedom of speech. China is a one party country that may consider too much freedom of speech to be dangerous; not only to the party’s strength, but other reasons too.

The other interesting point I’d like to point out is the issue on surveillance. There is not real “limit” to the surveillance that governments can use. I believe this too also has aligned interests from all governments. All governments have the incentive to have as much information as possible. This would make it easy to agree with one another. The phrase “necessary and proportionate” is too broad and is subject to interpretation; thus a limit is not identified. (Ref 3)

I particularly like the Root zone management where it “align incentives to ensure the accuracy and security of root zone maintenance”. I’m a big believer that when people have aligned interests, things get done much more efficiently. Such as to win a game, all players want to help each other achieve this goal. (ref 2)

“A better method would be to put IANA functions in the hands of actors with a strong self-interest in ensuring timely service, security and accuracy.” (ref 2)

This explains how it could be done to align the interests. I agree with it too. (ref 2)

So after much consideration, I do believe that government surveillance, monitoring, and censorship will be inevitable. There is no way around it. They will do it for sure. As long as we have government, they’d assume they know what’s best for us, and would like to keep tabs on our activities. We may get more transparency due to the freedom to write and share what we like and to receive data quickly from multiple sources, but at the end of the day, the government will monitor (as much as possible) on the types of data that is being shared. Though an internet with no government is rather scary as well. It will be open to hackers, and similar to capitalism; it is susceptible to monopoly. The internet could also be susceptible to hackers dominating the system and controlling data flow to only distribute what they want it to be. Of course all these scenarios are a little extreme; but if we use the assumption of capitalism and monopolies, it does make sense.

References:

Ref 1 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetMundial_Initiative

Ref 2 - http://www.internetgovernance.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/ICANNreformglobalizingIANAfinal.pdf

Ref 3 - http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2549270

Caelum (talk) 14:19, 14 April 2015 (EDT)

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This week offered a surprising glimpse into the complexities and technicalities of governing the Internet. While I considered myself a knowledgeable user of the Internet, I learned enough in this week’s reading to realize how little I know about its workings.

"Physical concepts are free creations of the human mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world. In our endeavor to understand reality we are somewhat like a man trying to understand the mechanism of a closed watch. He sees the face and the moving hands, even hears its ticking, but he has no way of opening the case…" (Ref 1, 31)

It was particularly fitting that our readings begin with the study of NETmudial (Ref 2, 217-237), which cracks open the metaphorical watchcase, above, to reveal the ingenious logistics of this meeting. I have participated in many formal efforts to create and revise codes and standards. My experience gives me a reference point from which to view how this diverse group brought together the tools and facilities that were needed in such short time and with so little financial support. Frankly, other efforts I have seen are weak in comparison to the NETmundial organizing effort.

The strengths of NETmundial seem to me to flow in part from the fundamental purpose to form a global organization capable of governing a global network. If such a global organization is to be formed and operate, its success would depend on its ability to communicate effectively and productively on a global basis. By offering physical meeting places, virtual connections, remote hubs, live multi-language translation, and crowdsourced consensus-building resources, the NETmundial organizing committee established a strong foundation for global governance. This is foundation enough to prove that communications and logistics are not substantial barriers to innovative models of wide area governance, and that we may exit familiar boxes relieve at least some of the constraints they impose. I return to Einstein and Infield and their view of how human perception tends to change over time, even with respect to what we consider fixed and immutable:

"In the case of the planets moving around the sun it is found that the system of mechanics works splendidly. Nevertheless we can well imagine that another system, based on different assumptions, might work just as well." (Ref 1, 31)

I think this week we learn that innovation in forms of governance is possible, and the values-based, collaborative, multistakeholder framework for NETmundial proves the hypothesis.

Works Cited

Reference 1 – Einstein, Albert and Infeld, Leopold. “The Evolution of Physics: The Growth of Ideas from Early Concepts to Relativity and Quanta.” Second Edition (1961). Cambridge University Press. Cambridge (Great Britain). Online Google Books. Accessed 14 April 2015.

Reference 2 – Gasser, Urs and Budish, Ryan and West, Sarah Myers. “Multistakeholder as Governance Groups: Observations from Case Studies (January 14, 2015). Berkman Center Research Publication No. 2015-1.” Online http://ssrn.com/abstract=2549270. Accessed 11 April 2015.

Gary Brown (talk) 14:49, 14 April 2015 (EDT)