Global management of the internet are a threat to its future — Plans for

I didn’t come up with the title for this post. It is the title of a recent piece in the world’s best news analysis publication, The Economist. The October 8-14 issue discusses the challenge to the United State’s management of the internet on page 16 and again on page 74. If you are a regular reader of Reglike you know that I think the US ought to retain control of the internet. The system is working now, and putting it in the hands of another ruling body could be catastrophic. Here are a few points brought up by The Economist, which also thinks the US ought to retain control of the internet:

“…although America’s exercise of power in the bricks-and-mortar world may not always have been flawless, its oversight of the internet, which it invented…has been remarkably benign. That’s probably partly since politics has been kept out of it. The longer it stays that way, the better.”

“Yet since the system runs under American auspices, other countries are unhappy with this arrangement. Many of those who want to relieve America of its control think ICANN’s job ought to be taken over by a United Nations agency. To anybody who has spent much time observing the UN at work, this sounds like a poor idea. (emhphasis added)

This next point is one I’ve made a number of times:

“It is also no accident that many of the countries loudest in their demands for the internet to be taken out of American hands are those, such as China, Iran and Saudi Arabia, that are keenest on restricting its use by their own citizens.”

Can you imagine if China’s government had a say in how the internet was run? We’re talking regarding the government that redirected traffic to Google to pro-government search engines, and regularly blocks web sites critical of the government.