Recent efforts to regulate the Internet could jeopardize not only its vibrancy, but also the benefits it brings to the world. Nations from across the globe met at the December 2012 World Conference on International Telecommunications in Dubai to consider changes to the International Telecommunications Regulations (ITRs). The treaty negotiations …
Chinese hackers have infiltrated the popular Internet messaging service Skype. The hackers have modified the operation of Skype so that the Skype programs on Chinese computers all have keyword systems to identify when the citizens use forbidden words, according to Jeffrey Knockel, a computer science researcher at the University of …
The Heritage Foundation will be holding a public event on February 13 to discuss the role of social media in the Arab Spring with experts from Heritage, Freedom House, and the Department of State. Social media showed its political potential during the Arab Spring, allowing “crowdsourcing” and the coordination of …
Earlier this week, three House subcommittees announced a joint hearing on February 5 to discuss the importance of keeping the Internet free from U.N. governance, which threatens U.S. economic interests and global Internet freedom. The U.N.’s International Telecommunications Union (ITU) has sought for years to expand its authority over the …
The good news for the Obama Administration is that its next Secretary of State, Senator John Kerry (D–MA), had the smoothest of sailing during yesterday’s Senate confirmation hearing. Indeed, the nominees for Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel, and Director of the CIA, John Brennan, should be so lucky. The only …
Regulating the Internet is a dream of autocratic governments and international organizations alike. This week and next, Internet governance will be the hot topic of the World Conference on International Telecommunications. The conference began on December 3 in Dubai and is hosted by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a U.N. …
Regulating the Internet is something Americans have resisted here at home. Now that fight is going global. The United Nations—of course—has an agency that oversees international telecommunications. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) was founded in 1865, when the telegraph was its main concern. Now it’s trying to expand its influence …
On September 27, Reporters Without Borders issued a report on the threat to Internet freedom that focused on the relationships of Google and YouTube in the Middle East and beyond. The call for censorship comes in response to the National Islamic Union’s complaint that Google has violated the “constitutional right …
Judging by President Obama’s speech to the U.N. General Assembly yesterday, U.S. public diplomacy messaging on the Middle East crisis is stuck perpetually on a setting of “apology.” It has been this way since the much-criticized September 11 statement from the U.S. embassy in Cairo, which apologized to the threatening …
