Is the interweb down?

BBC News - Should Obama's 'internet kill switch' power be curbed?

Well how ever we always joke about people who insist the whole internet is down when they cant access QVC shopping website etc. But wow, what a situation to be presented.

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billyr

I imagine if he ever did shut down some of the main ISPs the situation would be pretty similar to that South Park episode where they lose the internet.

Hypntick

billyr wrote: »

I imagine if he ever did shut down some of the main ISPs the situation would be pretty similar to that South Park episode where they lose the internet.

It was ghosts!

eMeS

Pash wrote: »

BBC News - Should Obama's 'internet kill switch' power be curbed?

Well how ever we always joke about people who insist the whole internet is down when they cant access QVC shopping website etc. But wow, what a situation to be presented.

Stories like this make me wish that news organizations would stop subtly and overtly editorializing.

It's weird to think that the most powerful person in the world would not have the power to do this in an emergency, regardless of what political party they represent. Also I think in an emergency this law would largely be irrelevant, as there are many other laws that give the president the power to do this. Our system gives the president enough discretionary power to make this happen....

MS

Pash

eMeS wrote: »

Stories like this make me wish that news organizations would stop subtly and overtly editorializing.

It's weird to think that the most powerful person in the world would not have the power to do this in an emergency, regardless of what political party they represent. Also I think in an emergency this law would largely be irrelevant, as there are many other laws that give the president the power to do this. Our system gives the president enough discretionary power to make this happen....

MS

Do you think that's right though? I know your response will be along the lines of that it doesnt matter if you personally think its right, congress says it is.....But the land of the free and all that....I know this sort of situation would only arrise from a national threat type emergency but what stops said system from malfunctioning...for example.

The rest of the world relies heavily on the US internet infrastructure. It's not like the rest of us would be able to continue on as normal if suddenly a switch like that is hit.

Anyway, just some thoughts.

earweed

Doesn't he have to ask Al Gores permission first though? LOL

stuh84

Pash wrote: »

The rest of the world relies heavily on the US internet infrastructure. It's not like the rest of us would be able to continue on as normal if suddenly a switch like that is hit.

Anyway, just some thoughts.

Given some of the biggest internet exchanges are in europe (LINX, the one in Amsterdam), so yeah while a lot of American services wont be available, the rest of the world will still be able to chug along.

I'm also quite uncertain how he would "kill" the internet, as it takes more than just saying "shutdown that pipe", there are that many transits between different exchanges, companies etc that it would be a MAMMOTH task to even begin to stop the traffic.

hypnotoad

Remember what happened when the EPA guy shut off the containment unit in ghostbusters and the world almost ended? I'm guessing it would be something like that. Except probably with pron.

Pash

stuh84 wrote: »

Given some of the biggest internet exchanges are in europe (LINX, the one in Amsterdam), so yeah while a lot of American services wont be available, the rest of the world will still be able to chug along.

I'm also quite uncertain how he would "kill" the internet, as it takes more than just saying "shutdown that pipe", there are that many transits between different exchanges, companies etc that it would be a MAMMOTH task to even begin to stop the traffic.

Yeh of course thats a valid point, I didnt say we would grind to a halt.

I could be completely inaccurate because I am just thinking and havent read much into it:-

I know they have shifted things about a lot but initially there was like root DNS servers hosted only in the US for many TLD's right? I know they shifted these things as much as possible. But my old mum can barely remember telephone numbers, IP's? no way.

So surely the impact of shutting down core network equipment like that would make things pretty insane.

Just more thoughts, I am sure some people can correct me, because I haven't put enough reading in.

eMeS

Pash wrote: »

Do you think that's right though? I know your response will be along the lines of that it doesnt matter if you personally think its right, congress says it is.....But the land of the free and all that....I know this sort of situation would only arrise from a national threat type emergency but what stops said system from malfunctioning...for example.

It is very irrelevant what any of us individually think. Also I don't see anything in our Constitution that specifically guarantees free and unfettered access to the Internet. I wouldn't think it would fall under the First Amendment, but you could make a case for it falling under the Ninth Amendment.

The rest of the world also heavily relies on our financial markets. These were shutdown in 2001 due to a national threat. I don't see too much of a difference.

Pash wrote: »

The rest of the world relies heavily on the US internet infrastructure. It's not like the rest of us would be able to continue on as normal if suddenly a switch like that is hit.

Finally! You guys admit that you can't live without us!

Seriously though I object more to news organizations trying to promote their specific opinions...

MS

Lizano

Politics aside, looking at this from a technical perspective. If your servers were compromised by an online hacker, what is the first thing you would do?

Take them off line wouldn't you? If I know a guy is snooping around a server that has confidencial information, I would freaking pull the ethernet cable off that server right away, stop the threat and do the post mortem.

If the President knows the CIA's network has been infiltrated, he should have the power to take Government Agencies' networks' offline (by offline I mean disconnect them from the internet) until they are certain that vulnerabities have been addressed.

bermovick

eMeS wrote: »

It is very irrelevant what any of us individually think. Also I don't see anything in our Constitution that specifically guarantees free and unfettered access to the Internet. I wouldn't think it would fall under the First Amendment, but you could make a case for it falling under the Ninth Amendment.

GAH! The constution doesn't list the things we, as the people, are allowed. It's design is to outline the powers of the federal government, then at the end say "and this is all". You could probably argue the internet would fall under the commerce clause, and likely succeed in your argument, but that's a power of the legislative branch, I believe, not the executive.

eMeS

bermovick wrote: »

GAH! The constution doesn't list the things we, as the people, are allowed. It's design is to outline the powers of the federal government..."

My point exactly.

bermovick wrote: »

...then at the end say "and this is all".

Because you've used quotes would you mind pointing me to exactly where this is said in the Constitution?

I'm certain it must be in Article VIII, also known as the purely made up fiction article.

But seriously, did you read the article that was linked? The law that gives the executive this authority was passed by Congress in the 1940's. The last time I checked it was the job of Congress to pass laws, and the job of the executive branch to carry out those laws. If Congress wants to change that authority they've given, then they can. However, the president has broad discretionary authority without or without this specific law in place.

The Internet is a bit irrelevant when you consider all of the other power invested in the executive branch....

MS

RobertKaucher

I think this type of law is needed by each and every country in the world. The idea being to curb an invader's ability to compramise and then use a nation's own communications systems against said nation. This makes perfect sense to me.

What do you guys imagine would be happening if the US were invaded or if a good portion of the US Internet infrastructure had been compramised by an enemy in a cyber attack? Do you think foreign Internetworks would be trying to move along with business as usual, crying about how the US had to shut down part os their Internet infrastructure? If this were to actually happen other governments would be doing the same things ensuring they were neither contributing to the attack nor open to being attacked.

We are talking about a 9/11 style cyber attack or actual physical invasion here.

That being said I do believe these laws need to be revised and modernized.

Pash

RobertKaucher wrote: »

I think this type of law is needed by each and every country in the world. The idea being to curb an invader's ability to compramise and then use a nation's own communications systems against said nation. This makes perfect sense to me.

What do you guys imagine would be happening if the US were invaded or if a good portion of the US Internet infrastructure had been compramised by an enemy in a cyber attack? Do you think foreign Internetworks would be trying to move along with business as usual, crying about how the US had to shut down part os their Internet infrastructure? If this were to actually happen other governments would be doing the same things ensuring they were neither contributing to the attack nor open to being attacked.

We are talking about a 9/11 style cyber attack or actual physical invasion here.

That being said I do believe these laws need to be revised and modernized.

Of course, again this is very valid. But at the same time, where are the lines drawn. Say you break UN ties and start a conflict for no given reason that the rest of the world has no say in...Or any country for that matter. But yes I guess in a bigger picture, does it really matter...situations that would bring about this sort of power being used are fortunately rare.

hypnotoad

Lizano wrote: »

If the President knows the CIA's network has been infiltrated, he should have the power to take Government Agencies' networks' offline (by offline I mean disconnect them from the internet) until they are certain that vulnerabities have been addressed.

If i managed a network at the CIA, i'd rather the president not come in with a 10,000 foot view of the problem and tell me to go offline.

If there was just one CIA network, maybe, but we're talking about thousands of computers with thousands of projects running all over the world. I'm guessing they run some pretty complicated programs and equipment that wouldn't come on very smoothly if it was disconnected. I mean, just to gracefully disconnect some of this stuff would probably take your staff longer than it takes to fix the security problem.