If You Ask The Question In A Certain Way, 61% Of Americans Say They Support An Internet Kill Switch

from the but-you-gotta-read-the-question dept

Thu, Oct 28th 2010 1:44pm — Mike Masnick

Slashdot points us to a story claiming that 61% of Americans "support an internet kill switch." Of course, this is a topic that's been hotly debated lately, with some attempt at passing laws that aren't really a "kill switch," but merely a coordinated way to reroute internet traffic in the event of some sort of "attack" (broadly defined) from a particular country.

That 61% number certainly sounded pretty high, and I was doubly skeptical when I read that the study came from Unisys, a security company who clearly stands to profit from greater "worries" about the still apparently bogus concept of "cyberwar." And, of course, people always point out that you can get a survey to say pretty much anything you want, depending on how you ask the question. So I went digging to see if I could find exactly what question Unisys (and its partner Lieberman Research Group) used to get this result. It took a bit of searching, but here's the question:

If there were clear evidence of a malicious cyber-security attack by a foreign government against our military, civilian government, electrical grid, financial systems, or other critical infrastructure, should the President have the authority to take control of or effectively shut down portions of the Internet to mitigate a crisis?

First of all, that's a big, big "if" right at the beginning there. Second, all of this assumes that an attack on the military, the government, the electrical grid, the financial system or other "critical infrastructure" could actually come via the internet. This isn't a reason to support an internet kill switch. It's a reason to get people to ask more reasonable questions, rather than broadbased scary questions, without highlighting the corresponding concerns, civil liberties issues and other worries. If you make any question "scary" enough, you can get people to agree with you, but that hardly means that people would actually want such a kill switch if they understood (a) the likelihood of such an attack, (b) what such a "kill switch" would actually mean, and (c) what alternatives there are.

In other words, this is pure propaganda from Unisys, rather than any bit of meaningful data.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: kill switch, surveys
Companies: unisys

39 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Dark Helmet (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 1:51pm

Sigh...
Question: If the fate of the entire human race was in jeapordy and the only way to save it was to reanimate the bodies of Jeffrey Dahmer, Adolph Hitler, and Charlie Chaplin, and then have them peform an around the world orgy on three thousand defenseless baby kittens dressed up as nuns, and to then have those kittens ground up into hot dog (get it?) meat and served intravenously to a panda bear, would you want that to happen?

Result: 94% of people think feeding molested kittens to black and white quadripeds is okey-schmokels....

Yay! Surveys are fun!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 1:59pm

86% of people like Live Free or Die Hard
(http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/live_free_or_die_hard/)

I'd guess 100% of people in Unisys PR like it.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
scarr (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:00pm

Re:
2% of the time, I'm not properly logged into TechDirt. :P
[ link to this | view in thread ]
:Lobo Santo (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:03pm

Re: Sigh...
Yep. "Lies, damn lies, and statistics" to quote Samuel Clement.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Gwiz, 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:25pm

A recent survey concluded that 3 out of 4 people make up 75% of the population.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
foobar (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:30pm

Correction
61% of the tiny minority of Americans who still have a land line and do not immediately hang up when they hear "survey."
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Jay (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:31pm

"If we were about to plunge into chaos and terrorists were about to use our own nuclear missiles to blow us to smithereens and the only to stop complete destruction of civilisation as we know it was to turn off part of the internet would you support it?"

39% of people said no... They can take my life and my liberty but they can never take my tweets!!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
TPBer (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:34pm

Re: Re: Sigh...
It's not a lie, it's a mere characterization of the truth"
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Alatar, 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:45pm

let them do it, and let us do it too
Question : if hundreds of millions of poor people were about to die from grave diseases, and some corporation was doing everything to destroy anyone who tries to bring them affordable medication, would you agree to do something to prevent that?"

Yeah, 100% of the American are supporting the abolition of the patent system!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ECA (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:46pm

That is a LOADED question..
Lets understand something FIRST..

1. international internet servers farms? How many? 8-12-16? locations?
2. A SECURE system. WHO in hell would give access to a computer Via internet, for a SECURE SYSTEM. an IDIOT.
3. What part of the question REALLY deals with the problem? Access to gov computers??(see #2)..
Corps? WHO cares. remember that the electric corps arnt government.
Infrastructure? roads?? I dont think so..
WHAT infrastructure has access to the NET?

NOW, critical attack?
wow, that sounds like SPAM to me.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ChurchHatesTucker (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:46pm

61?
They loaded the question like that and still got only 61% to agree?

Makes me proud to be an American.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:48pm

Oh yeah totally plausible
Statistics don't prove anything you didn't already know except that everybody in the universe has 2.4 legs and owns a hyena - Douglas Adams
8 out of 10 owners who expressed a preference said their cats preferred it - Wiskers cat food ad
98.63% of statistics are made up on the spot

Don't you love surveys done by people with a vested interest in the answer? And yet so many people buy into the answers (because they want to?).

Actually I remember China tried something like this - re-routing a significant part of the internet down a specific path. They totally snarked it up.. and I mean totally. Created a large routing loop I think. As I understand the structure of the interent, I'm not sure this is even possible to acheive correctly. Still I'm sure that won't get in the way of a good bit of fear mongering and consultancy fees.....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
xs (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 2:51pm

Re:
The original survey at least sounds like a reasonable scenario, yours is just ridiculous.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 3:09pm

Oh, and just for the hell of it...
... exactly where does the President of the United States get "the authority to take control of or effectively shut down portions of the Internet"?

Large potions of "the internet" are outside of the U.S., connections to bits of it in the U.S. are probably in places that are effectively foreign soil - wouldn't messing with either of those things constitute causus belli for the country(ies) so "threatened"?

Seriously? Nukes aren't bad enough? You want to give a position sometimes occupied by a buffoon or someone bought and paid for the ability to p*ss THAT much of the world off at once? Does anyone in the U.S> imagine the rest of the world would actually buy into this?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 3:25pm

lol obviously some people have no idea how the internet works, nor how governments/power companies/other important organisations should really have their own security measures.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 3:43pm

"If there were clear evidence" FSM! Didn't we learn anything from Iraq?!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 3:49pm

Re:
and 99 percent of statistics are made up on the spot.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:07pm

If Mike says its bad then 91% of td readers will automatically agree.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
BearGriz72 (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:15pm

Re: Re:
"The original survey at least sounds like a reasonable scenario"???

If there was "Clear evidence of a malicious cyber-security attack (Using the Internet) by a foreign government against our military, civilian government, electrical grid, financial systems, or other critical infrastructure. Do you honestly think we would have enough capability left to USE the Mythical Internet Kill Switch?
I think you've got to ask yourself one question: Do You feel lucky? Well, do you?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
darryl, 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:16pm

In the real world
Yes, here what Mike says, everyone (almost) just blindly follows..

Mike, why dont you frame the question a new for us ?

How would you spin that question to get the result that you want. .

And what is your problem with IF.

IF it did happen would you agree to this, yes or no.

How would you ask the question ?

It would be interesting to see how you would spin such a question to get your desired results ?

So go ahead..... but otherwise, what are you trying to say, that there is no possibility, and never will be any possibility of a cyber type attack on US infrastructure ?

Im so glad you are not responsible for my computer or personal security.. You dont have a clue do you !!!..

That is more scare than the US Govmnt seeing a problem and reacting to it, you cant even see a problem !!.. OMFG.

Are you sure your on the same planet or internet that everyone else is on ?

In the real world....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
BearGriz72 (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:21pm

Re:
And 24% of TD readers will automatically disagree.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
darryl, 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:25pm

PORTIONS --- know what that means Mike ?? anyone ??
If there were clear evidence of a malicious cyber-security attack by a foreign government against our military, civilian government, electrical grid, financial systems, or other critical infrastructure, should the President have the authority to take control of or effectively shut down portions of the Internet to mitigate a crisis?

Do you know what "PORTIONS" means ??? Mike..

THat word makes your headline a lie, no one said they agreed to an internet KILL SWITCH.. that is pure FUD..

read the question again Mike, and pay more attention next time..

2/10
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:26pm

Re: In the real world
Translation:
Blah blah blah [random lie vaguely based on a really tenuous interpretation of 1/4 of a sentence of the article] blah blah blah blah rant grr argh!

Hmm sorry could you repeat that? Wasn't really listening.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:30pm

Re: Sigh...
If you knew that an Internet kill switch will save lives, would you be in favor of it?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:33pm

This one's very cute and demonstrates once again of being careful what you ask for.

The supposition that we would "know" the source of an internet attack has been demonstrated over and over again to be very difficult with grey net, spoofing, bot nets, and willing countries to assist in aiding such an endeavor who view us as a threat but wish to avoid an all out declaration of war.

I have knowledge of industry practices that allow remote control/monitoring of facilities sometimes hundreds of miles from the facility location where physical processes may take place. These are usually engineering departments where it is necessary to monitor present conditions in near or at real time. Most of them also have provisions for remote shut downs or even changing the parameters of safety devices. It is done through special programs often requiring dongles on the computer to activate access and are strictly controlled as to possession of one.

The majority of the time it is handled through the internet on as near secure channels as possible.

Trust me when I say, I know they exist, I've used them.

What this appears to me to be is the initial attempt to seal the borders of the net under something similar to China's great firewall by unnamed parties in the government. To redo the internet into a clone of the great firewall would mean a total redesign of the internet and all pathways into the country. The US was never designed to be the same. The net grew haphazardly here and the design was not to route the "pipes" if you will into narrow necks to be monitored easily but rather it was designed to reroute to prevent failures.

This is FUD, pure and simple, trying to influence and gain support to do something no one in their right mind would really wish, if you wish choice and freedom. The saber rattlers will be sure to disagree.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:35pm

Re: Re:
But fanboy backlash stops them from commenting about their disagreement.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ECA (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:35pm

Re: Re: Re:
Lets see..

Internet FAST..
Finding out you have a BUG, SLOW..
Which would happen quicker? You KNOWING something is happening, BEFORE or after it started?

What? a DDOS attack on the 12-16 MAIN international relay servers? You wouldnt have a chance.

Any idiot Stupid enough to put Critical system(s) on the net, SHOULD be hacked.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ECA (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:37pm

Re: Re: Sigh...
And if you install critical systems with access to the net? you would be an idiot.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Jay (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 4:42pm

Re: PORTIONS --- know what that means Mike ?? anyone ??
Ahh... Daryl hate to be the one to point this out but Mike was quoting the article he links to, thats the whole point of this piece that the survey doesn't necessarily support the headline...

Maybe you might like to read the article again, and, well you know the rest of it...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
darryl's Mum, 28 Oct 2010 @ 6:21pm

Re: PORTIONS --- know what that means Mike ?? anyone ??
Oh dear, he's at it again.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ChurchHatesTucker (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 6:30pm

Re: Re: Re:
If only...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
abc gum, 28 Oct 2010 @ 6:31pm

If there were clear evidence of outrageously bad decisions by government, military, corporations, utilities, financial behemoths, or other fools, which authorized the connection of critical systems to the public internet ... should the President have the authority to take them out behind the shed and effectively open a can of whoopass?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
BearGriz72 (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 7:47pm

Re: Re: Re:
"But fanboy backlash stops them from commenting about their disagreement."

All 115% of them??? ;-D
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 28 Oct 2010 @ 8:35pm

Re: Re: Re: Re:
No, the 9% that disagree are the ones that comment. It was your BSA style math that pushed it over 100% -assume that insiders double count themselves.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ECA (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 9:42pm

Re:
I can understand this..
I can understand the protections NEEDED, and hopefully USED..and they arnt hard to put into place.
A dongle to hold a 512 character passcode using upper/lower case, Numbers and special characters, would take years to crack..
Code for the router
Code for the relay server
Code for the machine..
Then an Upload to your system to verify, and BACKTRACK..and if it dont run or is blocked from returning ITS SYSTEM LOCATION, a trip wire is sent.

Then have an OFFSITE, warning/trace system.
The laptop/desktop, ANY time it connects to the net, sends a PING/email.."here I am"
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ECA (profile), 28 Oct 2010 @ 9:44pm

Re:
IF a corp/company/gov computer were Left to the randomness of the internet..you might as well give a 12 year old a 9mm pistol and tell them to have fun.

I would look at the the IDIOT that set it up.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Evostick, 29 Oct 2010 @ 1:52am

Yes Minister
Humphrey: You know what happens: nice young lady comes up to you. Obviously you want to create a good impression, you don't want to look a fool, do you? So she starts asking you some questions: " Mr. Woolley, are you worried about the number of young people without jobs?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Are you worried about the rise in crime among teenagers?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Do you think there is a lack of discipline in our Comprehensive schools?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Do you think young people welcome some authority and leadership in their lives?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Do you think they respond to a challenge?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Would you be in favour of reintroducing National Service?"
Bernard: Oh...well, I suppose I might be.
Humphrey: "Yes or no?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: Of course you would, Bernard. After all you told her you can't say no to that. So they don't mention the first five questions and they publish the last one.
Bernard: Is that really what they do?
Humphrey: Well, not the reputable ones no, but there aren't many of those. So alternatively the young lady can get the opposite result.
Bernard: How?
Humphrey: "Mr. Woolley, are you worried about the danger of war?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Are you worried about the growth of armaments?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Do you think there is a danger in giving young people guns and teaching them how to kill?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Do you think it is wrong to force people to take up arms against their will?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: "Would you oppose the reintroduction of National Service?"
Bernard: Yes
Humphrey: There you are, you see Bernard. The perfect balanced sample.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
BearGriz72 (profile), 30 Oct 2010 @ 9:58am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Take a Joke Much?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
tax cpe, 31 Oct 2010 @ 2:40am

so much power!
We really wouldn't want to give that much power to a single person or organization, would we? Who's going to determine that the "kill switch" needs to be switched off?
[ link to this | view in thread ]