Kill Switch

[ATN082268]

  There was a recent USA Today article about a bill which would allow the President to shut down the internet (referred to as the "Kill Switch.") I'm not interested in the political or ethical aspects of it here but wanted to know if the Government had the capability to follow through with it. Can the Government do a lot more than require internet providers to shut down?

-Andrew

[I am Belch II]

A button that should not be created. I hope it wont be next to the button that launches the nukes!!!

[Guardsman]

I may not be American, so I'm safe, but there are a lot of websites I frequent in the United States!

[Taurevanime]

But the internet isn't a centralised thing that you can make an on/off switch for as far as I am aware. Yes ICANN happens to be located in the US, but they're only there to make sure everyone is speaking the same language when it comes to the internet.

So it doesn't strike me as being possible in the first place.

[cray]

The only way Egypt turned off its internet was to call up its ISPs and said, "Shut it down." They had no master kill switch button, and they were unable to block telephone dial-out connections to foreign ISPs.

The US, I believe, has a more fragmented, larger and distributed internet set-up than Egypt. It'd be a lot of work to shut down all the cable, DSL, telephone, and satellite connections, not to mention the many server farms.

[Guardsman]

The only way Egypt turned off its internet was to call up its ISPs and said, "Shut it down." They had no master kill switch button, and they were unable to block telephone dial-out connections to foreign ISPs.

The US, I believe, has a more fragmented, larger and distributed internet set-up than Egypt. It'd be a lot of work to shut down all the cable, DSL, telephone, and satellite connections, not to mention the many server farms.

Yes we can (Link)

[Demon55]

A button that should not be created. I hope it wont be next to the button that launches the nukes!!!

The government should not have control over the internet.

[Guardsman]

The government should not have control over the internet.

Uh, excuse me. It's been brought to my attention that a few bad apples out there are smoking marijuana. Uh, I've got news for you my friend, marijuana's illegal. Not cool. Alright then . . .

Establishment, establishment, you always know what's best

Members of the crowd shout. You suck!

Learn the rules!

[lucho]

Like Taurevanime and Cray pointed out, it's not a question of the merits of a 'kill switch.' The question is if it's possible at this point. I really doubt it personally.

[Daemonknight228]

A single button to simultaneously kill EVERY uplink?

without a doubt, absolutely NOT POSSIBLE, unless they're also shutting down every satelite uplink, cable TV provider, private server farm, telephone line, and also had C4 packed into the ocean bed cables.

[worktroll]

The only way Egypt turned off its internet was to call up its ISPs and said, "Shut it down." They had no master kill switch button, and they were unable to block telephone dial-out connections to foreign ISPs.

The US, I believe, has a more fragmented, larger and distributed internet set-up than Egypt. It'd be a lot of work to shut down all the cable, DSL, telephone, and satellite connections, not to mention the many server farms.

And it's much easier if it's "call it's ISP" - Egypt has one state-controlled ISP, and shutting that down disconnected 99% of external links. There was a flow-on effect - internal servers started erroring because they were used to being in contact with the outside world, so there was much more of an impact on internal internet than expected.

Many other governments have similar arrangments, but I suspect the US might have sufficiently many separate ISPs that such an action would be much harder to implement.

W.

[ANS Kamas P81]

What about something to disable the BIND system?  Everything stays up, IP addresses work fine, but nothing can resolve text-based addresses.

[sir_spamalot]

Saw this the other day... not really as much a possibility for US, but on the matter of principal it shouldn't even be considered acceptable.  My two cents.

[GBscientist]

The best way to shut down the internet would be to build a series of dirigibles with EMP bombs built in, that, on command, would fly over every major ISP and server farm and detonate their payload.  There.  No more internet.

[Grim_Reaper]

i suppose sending a major power surge through all the power lines may be a way to shut down the net, but that would most likely cause some damage to everyones home computers, stereos, televsions etc. not very practical.

[GBscientist]

Well, if you feel it necessary to stifle internal dissent by shutting down the Internet, you might as well kill the telephone lines, radio receivers, and TV sets as well.

[Marwynn]

It's probably just a trojan that'll infect all the browsers out there to load this page: http://www.1112.net/lastpage.html

It's not possible with the current architecture, but I'm assuming that when they say they're shutting down the internet they mean shutting off internet access in the United States. It'll be hard to do, but if they really wanted to they could.

[worktroll]

Well, if you feel it necessary to stifle internal dissent by shutting down the Internet, you might as well kill the telephone lines, radio receivers, and TV sets as well.

Don't forget your mobile (cell) phone network too - mobiles are the tool of choice for surreptitious assignations. Many countries have major problems with RIM, maker of the accursed Blackberry, for using encryption on their phones.

W.

[Wereferret]

The language of the bill, the debate and the bipartisan support for it made it clear that the purpose of the bill is to give the government authority to shut down *portions* of the internet, and only to effect security of critical infrastructure in the event of the very real threat of cyber-attack.  It is explicitly not intended to give the government the authority to shut the internet down nationally, rather national jurisdiction to shut down portions of the internet.  I, for one believe the government does have a national security obligation to be able to take that kind of action in the wake of emergent threats, particularly after the Stuxnet worm attack on the Iranian plant in Bushehr (ironically very likely the result of a combined U.S.-Israeli operation). 

[GBscientist]

There is a very easy way to shut down certain portions of the internet.  If a facility is at risk of a cyberattack, unplug the broadband/dial-up connection.  People seem to forget that things worked pretty well before we went and connected all the computers together.

Don't forget your mobile (cell) phone network too - mobiles are the tool of choice for surreptitious assignations. Many countries have major problems with RIM, maker of the accursed Blackberry, for using encryption on their phones.

W.

Gvien that RIM headquarters is less than an hour's drive from my home, I applaud the local supplier of handheld anarchy facilitation devices.

[Guardsman]

There is a very easy way to shut down certain portions of the internet.  If a facility is at risk of a cyberattack, unplug the broadband/dial-up connection.  People seem to forget that things worked pretty well before we went and connected all the computers together.

Gvien that RIM headquarters is less than an hour's drive from my home, I applaud the local supplier of handheld anarchy facilitation devices.

;D

[Kit deSummersville]

Don't forget your mobile (cell) phone network too - mobiles are the tool of choice for surreptitious assignations. Many countries have major problems with RIM, maker of the accursed Blackberry, for using encryption on their phones.

W.

You've stumbled upon the true beginning of the Rim Worlds Republic.

[Grim_Reaper]

Don't forget your mobile (cell) phone network too - mobiles are the tool of choice for surreptitious assignations. Many countries have major problems with RIM, maker of the accursed Blackberry, for using encryption on their phones.

W.

what good would Cell Phones be once teh Cell Towers are taken out?

[Ruger]

what good would Cell Phones be once teh Cell Towers are taken out?

Well, you could play the games or whatever else you had downloaded onto them...

 ;)

Ruger

[Guardsman]

You've stumbled upon the true beginning of the Rim Worlds Republic.

Kit knows too much . . .