4570Rick
Member
Found this in my news paper yesterday. 
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
Internet survives hijack attempt
U.N. summit turns aside efforts to take oversight of the Web away from U.S.
By ED ROYCE
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rep. Ed Royce, R-Fullerton, is a senior member of the House Committee on International Relations
Freedom has dodged a bullet - but it isn't in the clear, yet.
In the North African nation of Tunisia, the United Nations-sponsored World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) met last week under the guise of eliminating the "digital divide." Instead, the WSIS transformed into an effort to wrest control of the Internet away from you and me and place it under the control of U.N. bureaucrats. Luckily, this didn't happen - yet.
The Internet started with research funding provided by the Defense Department to establish a military network. (No, Al Gore didn't invent it.) As its use expanded and a market developed, the government got out. In the 1990s the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers took over responsibility, with oversight from the Commerce Department. This nonprofit corporation manages day-to- day operations of the Internet's domain-name and addressing system, with each nation's country-code Top-Level Domain (.com or .uk, for instance) remaining sovereign and subject to the policies and administration of its own government.
So, given that the Internet is such a profound achievement, why play with success? In the run-up to the summit, enemies of free expression, such as China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Cuba, teamed up to attempt to eliminate the United States' traditionally benign oversight role with the Internet and replace it with a U.N. group. Just as human-rights violators have been able to hijack the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, we can only presume that those rejecting free speech hope to get a foot in the door and shut down freedom of expression. No longer would the Internet be a bastion of freedom, a forum for people to express their thoughts and ideas, but perhaps become a highly censored version of its former self.
For proof, look no further than China, where Web sites are censored by what has become known as the "Great Red Firewall." Services such as Google and Yahoo are heavily filtered for sensitive content. Searches for "freedom" or "democracy" yield few, if any results.
Other countries, such as Vietnam, have pursued similar policies.
Such censorship is inimical to the current oversight with which the Internet has been accustomed. If we are to successfully combat oppressive regimes, we ought to fight for the ability of people everywhere to freely express themselves.
The Internet has quickly become one of the most important components of free enterprise. To the benefit of millions of entrepreneurs, it is an essential and vital tool in global commerce. International business transactions take place with a mouse click.
Fortunately, efforts to wrest away control of the Internet were rebuffed. Instead, the summit produced an agreement to establish a toothless international forum to simply discuss Internet issues. It's harmless, for now.
You can bet that governments resentful of the United States will continue their line of argument that it is not control of the Internet they seek, just the benefits it brings. Yet, as our U.N. Ambassador John Bolton warned, "Greater benefits means a greater say in how those benefits are distributed, and that's the camel's nose under the tent that we have to be very careful of. Whatever happens in [Tunisia] I don't think that's the end of the issue."
The instruments of the free-enterprise system - like the Internet - will be constantly under attack, requiring relentless vigilance on all of our parts. U.N. control of the Internet would pose a serious danger to freedom - a chance we cannot take. To maintain its integrity, we must continue to oppose those who wish to regulate and suppress it.
ANNAN COMMENT
An Associated Press account of the World Summit on the Information Society quoted U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan as telling the meeting: "The United States deserves our thanks for having developed the Internet and making it available to the world. But I think you also all acknowledge the need for more international participation in discussions of Internet governance issues."
No I don't have to acknowledge any such thing.
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
Internet survives hijack attempt
U.N. summit turns aside efforts to take oversight of the Web away from U.S.
By ED ROYCE
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rep. Ed Royce, R-Fullerton, is a senior member of the House Committee on International Relations
Freedom has dodged a bullet - but it isn't in the clear, yet.
In the North African nation of Tunisia, the United Nations-sponsored World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) met last week under the guise of eliminating the "digital divide." Instead, the WSIS transformed into an effort to wrest control of the Internet away from you and me and place it under the control of U.N. bureaucrats. Luckily, this didn't happen - yet.
The Internet started with research funding provided by the Defense Department to establish a military network. (No, Al Gore didn't invent it.) As its use expanded and a market developed, the government got out. In the 1990s the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers took over responsibility, with oversight from the Commerce Department. This nonprofit corporation manages day-to- day operations of the Internet's domain-name and addressing system, with each nation's country-code Top-Level Domain (.com or .uk, for instance) remaining sovereign and subject to the policies and administration of its own government.
So, given that the Internet is such a profound achievement, why play with success? In the run-up to the summit, enemies of free expression, such as China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Cuba, teamed up to attempt to eliminate the United States' traditionally benign oversight role with the Internet and replace it with a U.N. group. Just as human-rights violators have been able to hijack the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, we can only presume that those rejecting free speech hope to get a foot in the door and shut down freedom of expression. No longer would the Internet be a bastion of freedom, a forum for people to express their thoughts and ideas, but perhaps become a highly censored version of its former self.
For proof, look no further than China, where Web sites are censored by what has become known as the "Great Red Firewall." Services such as Google and Yahoo are heavily filtered for sensitive content. Searches for "freedom" or "democracy" yield few, if any results.
Other countries, such as Vietnam, have pursued similar policies.
Such censorship is inimical to the current oversight with which the Internet has been accustomed. If we are to successfully combat oppressive regimes, we ought to fight for the ability of people everywhere to freely express themselves.
The Internet has quickly become one of the most important components of free enterprise. To the benefit of millions of entrepreneurs, it is an essential and vital tool in global commerce. International business transactions take place with a mouse click.
Fortunately, efforts to wrest away control of the Internet were rebuffed. Instead, the summit produced an agreement to establish a toothless international forum to simply discuss Internet issues. It's harmless, for now.
You can bet that governments resentful of the United States will continue their line of argument that it is not control of the Internet they seek, just the benefits it brings. Yet, as our U.N. Ambassador John Bolton warned, "Greater benefits means a greater say in how those benefits are distributed, and that's the camel's nose under the tent that we have to be very careful of. Whatever happens in [Tunisia] I don't think that's the end of the issue."
The instruments of the free-enterprise system - like the Internet - will be constantly under attack, requiring relentless vigilance on all of our parts. U.N. control of the Internet would pose a serious danger to freedom - a chance we cannot take. To maintain its integrity, we must continue to oppose those who wish to regulate and suppress it.
ANNAN COMMENT
An Associated Press account of the World Summit on the Information Society quoted U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan as telling the meeting: "The United States deserves our thanks for having developed the Internet and making it available to the world. But I think you also all acknowledge the need for more international participation in discussions of Internet governance issues."
No I don't have to acknowledge any such thing.
