Abstract
Young people must be safeguarded, says
CALLS FOR CENSORSHIP of the internet come from many sides. This is not surprising, given that its openness has facilitated the propagation of misinformation and disinformation with the potential to disrupt safety around the world.
Often lost in this debate are the enormous benefits that the open internet has conferred and continues to offer. The discovery and sharing of useful information on the world wide web is, in part, responsible for the rapid development of defences against Sars-Cov-2 (Covid-19).
Major economic growth is directly attributable to internet-based businesses able to develop global markets. In the midst of the pandemic, billions of people were able to work from home, learn from home and avoid risky face-to-face gatherings.
The internet was born out of the initial need of the US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) to facilitate the sharing of computing resources and research among institutions in the USA, the UK and Norway. Despite its military research origins, the internet was incubated in an academic research environment. Its first users were network engineers and computer researchers. Their applications ranged from electronic mail and remote access to time-sharing and file transfer. Significant work was undertaken in pursuit of artificial intelligence applications such as speech understanding and image analysis.
Not long after the internet became operational in 1983, the US research agencies Nasa, the National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy built their own networks using the internet’s TCP/IP protocol suite and interconnected them through the expanding internet. Then research and education networks in other countries also implemented these protocols, connecting to what was becoming a global network.
Commercial service began in the USA in 1989. In 1991, the world wide web protocols were layered on top of TCP/ IP and spawned countless websites and new applications. Soon after, a wireless local network technology called Wi-Fi was developed.
With the arrival of the smart iPhone from Apple in 2007, the internet and world wide web became accessible from anywhere you could get a wireless mobile or Wi-Fi signal. The original three internet networks are long gone, and others as well, but the internet is less a thing than it is an architecture.
New networks will come, such as we are seeing with massive investment in low earth orbit satellites. An interplanetary internet is in development by the space-faring nations of the world. Research to develop a quantum internet is a new focus of attention to make feasible large-scale quantum computing. The open internet design continues to fuel its expansion and evolution.
The early years of the internet were forged in an atmosphere of academic information sharing and set the stage for the open internet from which we have benefited for decades. The freedom of the web has led to myriad applications in education, commerce, entertainment and government services, and the evolution of social media.
CREDIT: Gary Waters/Ikon
We have discovered, however, that the virtuality and apparent anonymity of the web has a downside. Like-minded people flock together in so-called cyberspace. Nowhere is this more apparent than in social media spaces. Negative views are reinforced. Trolls revel in stirring up emotions. Nations use these media to incite political turmoil. Revolutions are co-ordinated on mobile phones and their myriad apps.
To make matters worse, the software that animates millions of applications is vulnerable to hacking. Email users receive “phishing” messages intended to trick them into giving up passwords or money or both. Ransomware attacks hold companies and institutions hostage for ransom under threat of loss of vital information.
Botnets are created by co-opting vulnerable internet devices and using them to generate spam or denial-of-service attacks against internet infrastructure. Citizens, businesses and academic and government institutions are at risk. A common response to these hazards is to attempt to regulate the content of the internet. Demands are made of platform providers (mostly offering web-based services) to filter access to the content of the internet - in other words, to censor the system.
For some authoritarian governments, the freedom of the internet is a threat and the hazards of the online world provide an excuse for excessive monitoring of the users of the internet and censorship of content. Even in democratic countries, the risks of using online services have spurred efforts to impose content regulation on social media providers, web search services and even general internet access providers.
Censorship is not the best, or the only, response to the harmful behaviour we see on the internet. Applying critical thinking to what one sees and hears allows us to reject bad information. Cross-border co-operation to track down and apprehend people and organisations engaged in harmful behaviour is needed.
The creation of safe spaces for younger users is another reasonable response. For that case, monitoring, control and filtering may be justifiable. It is vital, however, to recognise that our young people grow up and must be prepared to encounter hostile conditions, misinformation and other risks as they navigate the online world and benefit from its richness and capacity for innovation.