Breaking the Internet: International Efforts to Play the Middle Against the Ends -- A Way Forward

The Internet was originally designed to provide robust transportation protocols for data transmission packets regardless of their content. While many arguments can be (and have been) made in defense of this approach, it is not the only approach. It was and is a choice, though one that has been largely maintained in the short history of the Internet’s existence.

Since the widespread adoption of networking technologies worldwide, efforts have been made internationally to fundamentally alter the way in which the Internet functions. A number of strategies or issues have recently come to the forefront in this regard including encryption, ISP data retention, “graduated response” rules, and rendering sites “invisible” by altering network functioning. The Net Neutrality debate is relevant here, as well.

Together, these efforts are taking place to some extent in the international arena, and all have significant international implications. All in one way or another seek to alter piecemeal the design of the Internet itself in pursuit of some other goal (such as protecting intellectual property rights or pursuing national security). They would all take at least one step toward turning the thin, dumb middle of the Internet into a thicker, smarter element that can be used as a counter to the ends that it connects.

These efforts will have unintended consequences in terms of Internet functionality and usefulness. It is not that the design of the Internet should not be changed. Rather, if the Internet’s functioning is to be fundamentally altered, such changes should follow not from a hodgepodge of national and international requirements resulting in a patchwork quilt of separately adopted, interest-based restrictions, but from international discourse focused on the Internet itself, leading to treaty or convention based obligations on those governments who are its participants. To do this properly, an international – as opposed to national or even regional – approach is required.

A number of existing international organizations have at least some potential for facilitating the kinds of discourse and decision-making necessary to maintain a holistic view of not just specific interests but of the overall structure and functioning of the Internet as a system. Each brings to the table characteristics that would assist in maintaining the efficiency of the Internet as a communications system, but each also suffers from negative characteristics, primarily as to narrowness of focus or to perceptions of special interest capture or control. After considering each of the likely suspects for taking on this important international role, the creation of a new organization is proposed, made up of representatives of many of these existing organizations as well as representatives from non-governmental-organizations dedicated to a future Internet that is robust, efficient, and innovative across a host of measures. Only with such an effort can the promise of the Internet as a communications system be realized.