The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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"...if a sitting president wants to shut down the Internet or selectively cut off a social media outlet or other service, all it takes is an opinion from his attorney general that Section 706 gives him the authority to do so."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... story.html
By Jessica Rosenworcel
March 8 at 4:14 PM

Jessica Rosenworcel has been a member of the Federal Communications Commission since 2012. This article is adapted from her keynote remarks at this year’s State of the Net Conference.

In the age of the always-on Internet, what happens when a government decides to turn it off? For many people around the world, this is no longer a theoretical question.

Last year, Internet service was shut off for roughly seven months in India’s Kashmir Valley, affecting 7 million people. The government of the world’s largest democracy justified the blackout by saying it was necessary to avoid protests and loss of life. In Bangladesh, a government-directed shut-off disrupted humanitarian and emergency services in Rohingya refugee camps for more than six weeks in 2019. Congo blacked out the Internet for 20 days after last December’s elections, preventing electoral observers from relaying information from rural polling stations. Ethiopian authorities shut down the Internet for three days last June to prevent student cheating on national exams. In January, there were outages in Iran during protests over the downing of a Ukrainian plane, following a week-long blackout last year after the price of fuel went up.

These shutdowns are the new normal in many parts of the world. According to the Internet research firm Top10VPN, a record 21 countries cut off the Internet 122 times in 2019, costing the global economy as much as $8 billion. Government officials often claim these Internet blackouts are needed to protect public safety. But deployed regularly, they can thwart the democratic process, threaten human rights and batter modern economic life.

You might think it could never happen here in the United States. But think again.

To understand how, start with the Communications Act of 1934 — which, though it has been amended and updated several times, is essentially an 86-year-old law that is still the framework for U.S. communications policy today.

Section 706 of this law allows the president to shut down or take control of “any facility or station for wire communication” if he proclaims “that there exists a state or threat of war involving the United States.” With respect to wireless communications, suspending service is permitted not only in a “war or a threat of war,” but merely if there is a presidential proclamation of a “state of public peril” or simply a “disaster or other national emergency.” There is no requirement in the law for the president to provide any advance notice to Congress.

The language here is undeniably broad. The power it describes is virtually unchecked. That’s not surprising, since some of the last changes made to this section of the law were introduced in 1942, shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor, when Congress was laser-focused on protecting our safety and security.

These are, of course, different days. After all, back in 1942, “wire communication” meant telephone calls or telegrams, and “wireless” meant radio. But if you think this language, and what it authorizes, have faded into the dustbin of history, you’re wrong. Today those terms have generally been accepted as including access to the Internet. And as recently as 2010, a Senate committee report on protecting cyberspace concluded that section 706 “gives the President the authority to take over wire communications in the United States and, if the President so chooses, shut a network down.” That means if a sitting president wants to shut down the Internet or selectively cut off a social media outlet or other service, all it takes is an opinion from his attorney general that Section 706 gives him the authority to do so.

That’s alarming. Because if you believe there are unspoken norms that would prevent a U.S. president from using Section 706 this way, recent history suggests that past practice is no longer the best guide for future behavior. Norms are now broken all the time in Washington.

It’s time for a front-to-back assessment of Section 706. We need a dialogue about what it means and what it should mean in the digital age. We need Congress to consider how this power squares with the Constitution and ask what role there should be for the legislative and judicial branches. While we’re at it, the United States should develop a formal policy on government-directed Internet shutdowns, informed by the experience of the State Department, Commerce Department and Federal Communications Commission. Then we should share this expertise with other countries so that we can work worldwide to keep the Internet open and available.

We need this discussion. Without having it, our existing law could be contorted to support outages, and we should expect to see government-directed shutdowns happen in many more places — including right here at home.
It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocketbook often groans more loudly than an empty stomach.

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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The nature of the internet is such that the government, if directed by the executive branch to shut off civilian access to communications services, has to get emergency court orders for all the internet service providers to have them disconnect their servers from the backbone.

Whether this involves software or actually physically disconnecting hardware is probably known only to the service providers.

In the past when communications were voice and teletype only, the telephone switch exchanges at the central offices needed to be physically turned off.

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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lurker wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 1:54 pm cutting off the internet is a sure way for ANY ADMINISTRATION to incite revolution. heck, look how fussy we get if we cant get into this forum for an hour or so, you'd think it's the end of the world. if you want 300+ million disgruntled bored people banging on your door, shut down the internet.
Yep. And it would really tank the economy.

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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They could shut it down, but it would cause utter chaos and economic collapse. Every legal business transaction goes through the internet if it involves banks at any level. Almost all civilian communications goes through the internet at one point or another, except maybe HAM radio and that is a small segment and getting smaller.
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.-Huxley
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." ~ Louis Brandeis,

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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harriss wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 1:48 pm The nature of the internet is such that the government, if directed by the executive branch to shut off civilian access to communications services, has to get emergency court orders for all the internet service providers to have them disconnect their servers from the backbone.

Whether this involves software or actually physically disconnecting hardware is probably known only to the service providers.

In the past when communications were voice and teletype only, the telephone switch exchanges at the central offices needed to be physically turned off.
Section 706 only requires AG Barr to agree. Would someone fight it out in the courts? Yes. How long would that take? Who controls the courts?

Good luck thinking it can't happen. Lots of things seemed unthinkable before 2016.
It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocketbook often groans more loudly than an empty stomach.

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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TrueTexan wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 1:57 pm They could shut it down, but it would cause utter chaos and economic collapse. Every legal business transaction goes through the internet if it involves banks at any level. Almost all civilian communications goes through the internet at one point or another, except maybe HAM radio and that is a small segment and getting smaller.
You assume the economy is the chief concern to a Trump who loses (or wins) in 2020.
It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocketbook often groans more loudly than an empty stomach.

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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featureless wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 2:09 pm Can you just imagine if internet entertainment and shopping were cut? Fucking pandemonium. I don't see .gov turning it off unless things get really awful, at which point, it won't much matter.
They can cut off just parts of the internet (e.g. Twitter, CNN) or certain regions (e.g. California or just cities).
Section 706 of this law allows the president to shut down or take control of “any facility or station for wire communication” if he proclaims “that there exists a state or threat of war involving the United States.” With respect to wireless communications, suspending service is permitted not only in a “war or a threat of war,” but merely if there is a presidential proclamation of a “state of public peril” or simply a “disaster or other national emergency.” There is no requirement in the law for the president to provide any advance notice to Congress.
It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocketbook often groans more loudly than an empty stomach.

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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K9s wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 2:21 pm
featureless wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 2:09 pm Can you just imagine if internet entertainment and shopping were cut? Fucking pandemonium. I don't see .gov turning it off unless things get really awful, at which point, it won't much matter.
They can cut off just parts of the internet (e.g. Twitter, CNN) or certain regions (e.g. California or just cities).
Section 706 of this law allows the president to shut down or take control of “any facility or station for wire communication” if he proclaims “that there exists a state or threat of war involving the United States.” With respect to wireless communications, suspending service is permitted not only in a “war or a threat of war,” but merely if there is a presidential proclamation of a “state of public peril” or simply a “disaster or other national emergency.” There is no requirement in the law for the president to provide any advance notice to Congress.
But California controls the internet! We are Silicon Valley. :fun:

Plus, he wouldn't/couldn't shut off Twitter. How would he keep his little fingers busy?

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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TrueTexan wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 1:57 pm They could shut it down, but it would cause utter chaos and economic collapse. Every legal business transaction goes through the internet if it involves banks at any level. Almost all civilian communications goes through the internet at one point or another, except maybe HAM radio and that is a small segment and getting smaller.
While still a very small percentage of the total population, the number of Amateur Radio licensees in the US has been increasing:

http://www.ah0a.org/FCC/Licenses.html

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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There is no magic switch in the white house that trump can flip to turn off the internet like turning off a light. And there is no magic switch anywhere as a matter of fact. Not at the pentagon, not at the FBI, not at the NSA. A magic switch doesn't exist.

The world wide web which is a subset of the internet like ftp or gopher which is what people used before there were browsers, it took 30 years to get to where it is today. My guess is it would probably take years to shut down although not as many years as it took to build.

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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Not too many independent internet service providers in the marketplace. Shut off ATT, Comcast, etc, and mobile internet and most people would have no access. Or just block most regularly used ports to kill off http and https access (80, 443, 8080) and leave email ports open for businesses. Keeping most people off the internet isn't that difficult if they want to do it.

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It is an unfortunate human failing that a full pocketbook often groans more loudly than an empty stomach.

- Franklin D. Roosevelt
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Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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This would get to SCOTUS in a New York Minute - it's 1A and think of how much of the economy depends on it as featureless said. The Pentagon Papers case showed how hard it was to stop newspapers from publishing something embarrassing, the Internet would be much more difficult. The right wing conspiracy would be right up there complaining and Trump wouldn't have his Twitter to keep his followers jacked up with fake news.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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You don't shutdown the ISPs you just shutdown the major backbone routers of the network by telling the few major carriers to shut them down or only allow data from approved sites such as military and certain government black op sites. If they don't agree then you send in your trusted goons and seize them. If you think you can get around them then you might as well go back to copper wires and 128K dialup modems using terminal mode shell accounts.
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.-Huxley
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." ~ Louis Brandeis,

Re: The U.S. government couldn’t shut down the Internet, right? Think again.

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TrueTexan wrote: Tue Mar 10, 2020 10:18 am You don't shutdown the ISPs you just shutdown the major backbone routers of the network by telling the few major carriers to shut them down or only allow data from approved sites such as military and certain government black op sites. If they don't agree then you send in your trusted goons and seize them. If you think you can get around them then you might as well go back to copper wires and 128K dialup modems using terminal mode shell accounts.
You're zeroing in on it. But having said that, there are still tens of millions of backbone routers and switches in the US alone. There are several companies that make these, not just Cisco.

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