Re: [gaia] Blog on AFRINIC proposal

+1..

Probably the only option for encountering this is to have alternative
methods of access (e.g. the firechat during the hongkong protests) -
so that the govts know that there is no point shutting down networks..

decentralisation is a form of resiliency..

arjuna

On 4 June 2017 at 16:43, Andrew Sullivan <ajs@anvilwalrusden.com> wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 03, 2017 at 05:09:51PM +0300, Nicolas Pace wrote:
>> One could be cross boarder links, or border IXPs... But I'm not that versed in these things to give an opinion
>>
>
> A government sufficiently motivated to "shut down the Internet" will
> shut down those links and IXPs too, unless they are of sufficient
> density and number that the government can't go after them all.  The
> "numbers" problem is actually _part_ of the problem.  (This is also,
> of course, why increased concentration in "tier 1" transit providers
> is dangerous for the Internet.)
>
> But the more basic problem with the proposal as presented is that it
> is attempting a tech fix to a social problem.  Governments who
> intervene in this way have decided that access to the Internet by
> (some subset of their) citizens is less valuable to them than control
> over communications.  This pattern is the same whether it is shutdowns
> by any government anywhere, or (in my opinion) less catastrophic but
> more corrisive attacks such as overall weakening of cryptographic
> algorithms or the hoarding of network-effective vulnerabilities.
>
> The answer to all of that is to continue to make the Internet ever
> more valuable both in its own terms and in social terms.  We want to
> create the conditions in which, when governments say they're going to
> "shut down" the Internet, they look absurd because they're going to do
> most damage to themselves.  I want it to be as the scene in _Blazing
> Saddles_: "Nobody move or the prisoner* gets it!"  That's not
> advocacy, of course.  It's instead, "Everything over IP."  Still a
> good slogan.
>
> Best regards,
>
> A
>
> * note: not the actual word in the scene.
>
> --
> Andrew Sullivan
> ajs@anvilwalrusden.com
>
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-- 
Arjuna Sathiaseelan
Personal: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~as2330/
N4D Lab: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~as2330/n4d