When The Creators Of Both The Internet And The Web Come Out Against The ITU, Shouldn't You Too?

from the just-saying... dept

We've been talking a lot about the ITU and its WCIT (World Conference on International Telecommunications) lately, given the importance of various proposals on the future of the internet. While Vint Cerf, often considered the "father of the internet" for his early (and continued!) contributions to the core of the internet, has been quite outspoken for many months about the threats of the ITU towards the internet, now we can add the creator of the World Wide Web to the list as well. Tim Berners-Lee has spoken out against the ITU efforts at WCIT.

Sir Tim is director of a standards body himself - the World Wide Web Consortium. He said that governments can already influence changes but should resist further interference.

"I think it's important that these existing structures continue to be used without any attempt to bypass them," he said.

"These organisations have been around for a number of years and I think it would be a disruptive threat to the stability of the system for people to try to set up alternative organisations to do the standards." Accelerating access

[...] "A lot of concerns I've heard from people have been that, in fact, countries that want to be able to block the internet and give people within their country a 'secure' view of what's out there would use a treaty at the ITU as a mechanism to do that, and force other countries to fall into line with the blockages that they wanted to put in place."

When the fathers of both the internet itself and the World Wide Web are both speaking out against the ITU's efforts to have further control over the future of the internet, isn't it time to step back and ask what benefit the ITU would really provide. To date, none has been shown. Instead, we get vague talk about increasing "fairness" by diverting money from innovators to telcos who haven't innovated with the promise that this will lead to greater investment. Yet, the evidence suggests that this doesn't work, and historically, such transfers and subsidies tend to be pocketed by execs (or governments) rather than invested in infrastructure.

So, here we have two of the most visionary innovators out there -- who created the key platforms we rely on -- highlighting how the ITU process is the exact wrong way to go about things. Combine that with the key argument being made by the ITU being unsupportable based on history. And shouldn't we all be wondering why this big charade is happening in the first place?

Filed Under: bottom up, itu, tim berners-lee, top down, vint cerf, wcit

ITU: Not Even Good At Not Being Transparent, Accidentally Releases Deep Packet Inspection Standard

from the look-at-that dept

Earlier this week, we wrote about how the ITU had secretly approved a standard for deep packet inspection behind closed doors. This was troubling on a number of different levels, including the idea that they're even trying to standardize such a thing, and that they're doing so in secret. However, after the news came out, Asher Wolf decided to tweet a simple question, asking if anyone had access to documents about the DPI standard. And a funny thing happened: Toby Johnson, a PR/communications guy for the ITU, responded and offered to send the documents. Which he did. And then, five hours later, after Asher had spoken about them publicly and sent them around to a bunch of journalists, she got an email saying that the documents were for her eyes only, and not to publish or share them "in part or in whole."

Yes, the ITU is so incompetent that they can't even do secrecy right.

Richard Chirgwin has a pretty good rundown on how ridiculous the DPI standard is, but perhaps more bizarre, as Wolf points out, the documents show that the ITU didn't think it was worth studying the impact of such a standard before implementing one -- which would suggest (yet again) that the ITU appears to go about things backwards.

Filed Under: dpi, itu, leaks

ITU's Sticky WCIT: Do New Rules Cover Just Big Telcos... Or Absolutely Everyone?

from the that-makes-a-big-difference dept

As the ITU's World Conference on Telecommunications (WCIT) continues in Dubai, a rather important "debate" has slowed any progress to a crawl. The key thing that is being worked on, of course, is new International Telecommunications Regulations (ITRs). Most of the debates we've talked about to date have been about what kind of mandate the ITU might have on things outside its direct areas of interest, as indications were that they wanted to expand the ITRs to cover things like the internet, online security and more. But a key fight shows how it goes beyond even just that. The big debate at WCIT right now is over a simple definition that could have massive implications: will the ITRs apply to "recognized operating agencies" or just "operating agencies." Seems simple, right? Not really.

Currently, the ITRs apply to "recognized operating agencies" which tend to be the huge telcos, often either state owned, or formerly state owned (and often still closely aligned with the government). Basically, the big national telcos that everyone is aware of. Those are considered "recognized operating agencies." But, if they take out the word "recognized" then it would cover: "any individual, company, corporation or governmental agency which operates a telecommunication installation."

Have you set up a WiFi network in your home? Well, then, you just might be included in that definition. See how that one little word could make a massive difference in the impact of the new ITRs? Basically, it's a question of whether or not the new rules will apply to the giant national telco companies... or everyone. Countries are taking sides and there's a bit of a stalemate, as noted by .nxt:

Lined up against this measure [of expanding the coverage to everyone] are Canada, CEPT, Citel, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Poland and the United States. For it are the Arab States, African States, Brazil, India, Iran, Philippines and RCC.

The conference chair is now pushing for a sort of "compromise" that certainly sounds a lot like siding with those in favor of the massively expanded definition. He's in favor of using "operating agencies" rather than "recognized operating agencies" but then trying to allow for "exclusions" to the definition by pointing to Article 38 of the ITU Constitution. Of course, that doesn't clarify anything. It just makes things more confusing.

Even if Article 38 could be used to "exclude" certain entities -- say, individuals and small businesses -- there would still be a massive problem. Beyond the fact that these rules would apply to many more companies who have no idea what's going on, it's a fundamental shift in thinking about the ITRs. It goes from rules that are limited to just a few giant telcos to ones that are de facto inclusive of just about everyone... leaving only "exceptions." In some ways, it reminds me of the switch in copyright from an opt-in system, to one in which everything was automatically covered with just a few "exceptions." That sort of thing has been a disaster on the copyright front, and would be an equal, if not bigger, disaster for telecom rules.

Filed Under: itrs, itu, mandate, operating agencies, regulations, wcit

No Surprise Here: Congress Passes Unanimous Resolution Telling The ITU: Hands Off The Internet

from the but-of-course dept

One thing that's been somewhat universal in the US is pretty much everyone's opposition to the whole ITU WCIT charade going on in Dubai right now. It doesn't matter what political party they belong to or what general views on technology or the internet they hold, pretty much everyone recognizes, even if there are faults with the system today, giving the ITU more control will inevitably make things worse. So it should come as little surprise that Congress has passed another resolution (they did an earlier one in August that more or less said the same thing) unanimously (397-0) telling the ITU to not even think about trying to take over any aspect of internet governance. This resolution first was approved in the Senate and this is just the House concurring.

Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), That it is the sense of Congress that the Secretary of State, in consultation with the Secretary of Commerce, should continue working to implement the position of the United States on Internet governance that clearly articulates the consistent and unequivocal policy of the United States to promote a global Internet free from government control and preserve and advance the successful multistakeholder model that governs the Internet today.

Of course, such a resolution is technically meaningless. It's mostly just a bit of warning, that if the ITU does actually lead to significant changes in internet governance, the US is unlikely to go along with them. In an age where it's rare to see bipartisan support of anything, it's nice to see pretty much everyone recognize the ITU process is dangerous and undesirable.

Filed Under: congress, internet governance, itu, wcit

US Hypocrisy: Supports Open Dialog On Internet Governance At WCIT; But Full Secrecy At Parallel TPP Negotiations

from the hypocrites dept

Back in October, we pointed out how the US delegation to the ITU WCIT (World Conference on International Telecommunications) was pushing for much more openness and transparency for the notoriously closed and secretive process that could impact internet governance. That was certainly refreshing to see. But it also stood in stark contrast to the same US government's massively secretive and opaque process to the Trans-Pacific Parntership agreement -- which could have just as much, if not more, of an impact on internet governance issues.

With negotiations on both issues happening simultaneously (WCIT in Dubai and TPP negotiations in New Zealand) it seems quite crazy to see the US speaking out vehemently in favor of greater openness and transparency in Dubai, while actively trying to prevent similar transparency in Auckland. Here's the State Department on WCIT:

On the eve of the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), we believe that it is the right time to reaffirm the U.S. Government's commitment to the multistakeholder model as the appropriate process for addressing Internet policy and governance issues. The multistakeholder model has enabled the Internet to flourish. It has promoted freedom of expression, both online and off. It has ensured the Internet is a robust, open platform for innovation, investment, economic growth and the creation of wealth throughout the world, including in developing countries.

[....] The Internet's decentralized, multistakeholder processes enable us all to benefit from the engagement of all interested parties. By encouraging the participation of industry, civil society, technical and academic experts, and governments from around the globe, multistakeholder processes result in broader and more creative problem solving. This is essential when dealing with the Internet, which thrives through the cooperation of many different parties.

The global community has many serious topics to discuss with respect to the Internet. Collectively, we need to ensure that these matters are taken up in suitable multistakeholder venues so that these discussions are well informed by the voices of all interested parties.

Our commitment to the multistakeholder model is based on the fact that transparency, inclusion and participation are the 21st century standards governing discussions related to modern communications.

Yet, over in New Zealand, US officials, as well as negotiatiors from others countries, are taking the opposite view. They're doubling down on secrecy, not transparency. They are not using a "multistakeholder" model at all, but rather locking out civil society and public interest groups. They've ignored or limited the ability of the innovation industry to have any say in the proceedings at all, and (most ridiculously) they're enforcing a secrecy policy many times worse than what we see at the ITU with WCIT. Many of the documents from WCIT have leaked out, while precautions mainly driven by the US government have, to date, limited the leaks from TPP negotiations.

It's really quite incredible that the same government can make those claims about openness, transparency and the importance of a multistakeholder process on the one hand, while going in the opposite direction on basically the same exact issue at the very same time for an event held elsewhere. The whole thing stinks of hypocrisy, which could easily be solved by opening up the TPP process, revealing the negotiating documents for public comment, and allowing the public into the process. After all, in the words of the US government:

We have and will continue to advocate for an Internet that is not dominated by any one player or group of players, and one that is free from bureaucratic layers that cannot keep up with the pace of change. We will work with everyone to ensure that we have a global Internet that allows all voices to be heard.

If only the US government would listen to that important message.

Filed Under: hypocrisy, internet governance, itu, openness, tpp, transparency, ustr, wcit

Why The ITU's Plans To Divert Money To Lazy Telcos Will Slow Internet Buildout, Not Increase It

from the damn-history dept

We've noted that among the proposals being pushed this week at the ITU's World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) are a few that are solely designed to divert money from innovative internet companies to stodgy old telcos who haven't adapted. The ITU has defended such proposals as being about sharing revenue more fairly, which tends to be a warning sign for most folks that failed organizations are about to take money from successful ones. Indeed, a number of proposals have suggested a form of "sending party pays" infrastructure for peering, claiming that such a system was successful (via the ITU) for telco buildout, and so they could do the same thing for the internet. Of course, this leaves aside the vast differences in how the networks work and where they came from -- and how a "sending party pays" internet system would almost certainly lead to a balkanized and fragmented internet.

But, it's even worse. A new study by Eli Dourado looking at how well "sending party pays" actually worked in the telco system found that it tended to hinder growth, rather than accelerate it:

The possible extension of the telephone system’s “sender-pays” rule to the Internet is a contentious international political issue under consideration at the World Conference on International Telecommunication (WCIT). This paper examines whether higher international telephone rates support or impede telecom sector growth in the receiving country. It uses data on international telephone rates from the US from 1992-2010 to explain growth in foreign telecom sectors during the same period. I find that higher international calling rates are correlated with slower growth in the telecom sector, which suggests that countries are not primarily using higher charges to finance additional expansion. These findings cast doubt on proposals that would extend sender-pays to the Internet sector.

In other words, the key argument the ITU likes to make for this diversion of funds... isn't actually supported by the facts. Instead, it's what we expected: about helping big telcos (often either state-owned, or formerly stated owned with still close connections) get a bunch of money for nothing... which they then won't invest in expanding the network (why should they?). And, oh yes, the implementation of such a system might just also make it easier to limit internet access and/or spy on nearly everything people do (how else do you charge if you're not monitoring activity?).

Filed Under: eli dourado, investment, itu, sender pays, wcit

ITU Approves Deep Packet Inspection Standard Behind Closed Doors, Ignores Huge Privacy Implications

from the and-they-want-us-to-trust-them? dept

Techdirt has run a number of articles about the ITU's World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) currently taking place in Dubai. One of the concerns is that decisions taken there may make the Internet less a medium that can be used to enhance personal freedom than a tool for state surveillance and oppression.

Against that background, a story published by the Center for Democracy & Technology about the ITU's work in the area of standards takes on an extra significance:

The telecommunications standards arm of the U.N. has quietly endorsed the standardization of technologies that could give governments and companies the ability to sift through all of an Internet user's traffic -- including emails, banking transactions, and voice calls -- without adequate privacy safeguards. The move suggests that some governments hope for a world where even encrypted communications may not be safe from prying eyes.

The new Y.2770 standard is entitled "Requirements for deep packet inspection in Next Generation Networks", and seeks to define an international standard for deep packet inspection (DPI). As the Center for Democracy & Technology points out, it is thoroughgoing in its desire to specify technologies that can be used to spy on people:

The ITU-T DPI standard holds very little in reserve when it comes to privacy invasion. For example, the document optionally requires DPI systems to support inspection of encrypted traffic "in case of a local availability of the used encryption key(s)." It's not entirely clear under what circumstances ISPs might have access to such keys, but in any event the very notion of decrypting the users' traffic (quite possibly against their will) is antithetical to most norms, policies, and laws concerning privacy of communications.

One of the big issues surrounding WCIT and the ITU has been the lack of transparency -- or even understanding what real transparency might be. So it will comes as no surprise that the new DPI standard was negotiated behind closed doors, with no drafts being made available.

But probably most worrying is the following aspect:

Several global standards bodies, including the IETF and W3C, have launched initiatives to incorporate privacy considerations into their work. In fact, the IETF has long had a policy of not considering technical requirements for wiretapping in its work, taking the seemingly opposite approach to the ITU-T DPI document, as Germany pointed out [doc] in voicing its opposition to the ITU-T standard earlier this year. The ITU-T standard barely acknowledges that DPI has privacy implications, let alone does it provide a thorough analysis of how the potential privacy threats associated with the technology might be mitigated.

This apparent indifference to the wider implications of its work is yet another reason why the ITU is unfit to determine any aspect of something with as much power to affect people's lives as the Internet.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and on Google+

Filed Under: deep packet inspection, itu, privacy, wcit

Doubling Down On Secrecy: ITU Believes Secret Media Strategy Key To Avoiding SOPA/ACTA Fate

from the good-luck-with-that dept

As the WCIT (World Conference on International Telecommunications) gets under way in Dubai, the ITU is making its play to regulate the internet, potentially to aid authoritarian governments in censoring or limiting the internet, or to divert money from innovative internet companies to stagnant state telcos out of a claim of "fairness." There's obviously been a lot of talk about it, and the ITU keeps claiming that it's just a neutral body to facilitate discussions, even as increasing evidence suggests it's urging many of the crazier proposals forward itself.

And now it's come out that ITU officials recently held a "secret" meeting to figure out how they were going to avoid getting SOPA'd, having the world rise up in protest as it tries to implement its internet regulatory regime. Following some bizarre and paranoid fantasy about how the anti-ITU, anti-WCIT efforts are really just because an unnamed "lobbying group" didn't like one proposal (the one mentioned above about diverting money from internet companies to telcos), the meeting got down to business: how could they use social media to prevent SOPA- or ACTA-like uprisings from the public:

In response to the anti-WCIT “campaign,” according to the September retreat’s preparatory materials, the ITU reluctantly launched a “counter-campaign,” which the agency believes “has been fairly successful outside the US and somewhat successful even in the US,” where “some of the statements made to denigrate ITU and WCIT are so extreme that they were easy to challenge and rebut.”

Going forward, the ITU focused at its meeting on the possibility of an “intensive anti-ratification campaign in OECD countries, based on the so-called lack of openness of the WCIT process, resulting in a significant number of countries refusing to ratify the new ITRs.” The ITU calls this possibility “the so-called ACTA scenario,” referring to sometimes violent protests against the secret ACTA treaty that took place this year.

To develop the next phase of its “counter-campaign,” the ITU hosted speakers from leading PR and advertising agencies to advise them on the use of social media. For example, Matthias Lufkens, Head of Digital Strategy for global public relations firm Burson-Marsteller, gave a presentation on how his agency helped the World Economic Forum leverage tools such as Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr to fend off “occupy”-style protests that occurred both physically in Davos and on the Internet.

“There is a risk that [the ACTA scenario] will happen, but our communication campaign can mitigate this,” the internal document says.

Of course, the campaign doesn't really appear to be going that well -- especially since so much of it revolves around "deflect[ing] media questions from secrecy, taxes and censorship" to the blandly empty (and absolutely silly) statement that "the revised ITRs have the exciting potential to pave the way for a broadband revolution in the 21st century." I'm sure that sounds catchy on a tweet. The problem, of course, is that folks on the internet don't tend to believe that kind of bureaucrat-speak when they know it's not true. As Downes notes:

Here’s the unvarnished truth, which no PR agency can help the agency talk, tweet, or prevaricate their way around: The commercial Internet emerged and matured entirely since the treaty was last reviewed. It developed in spite of the ITRs, not because of them.

There is a familiar pattern here of ambitious regulators who have no expertise and little experience with the Internet proclaiming themselves its benevolent dictators, only to find the peasants revolting before the coup has even started.

The ITU is no different than the sponsors of ACTA, SOPA, PIPA, and other attempts at regulating the Internet, its content, or its users by governments large and small. Like the media lobbyists who continue to see the successful fight to kill SOPA and PIPA as a proxy war waged solely by Google and other Internet companies, the ITU simply can’t accept the reality that Internet users have become their own best advocates.

Once again, these bureaucrats really have no clue what they're doing.

Filed Under: acta, itu, media, secrecy, sopa, strategy, wcit

The Internet Isn't Broken; So Why Is The ITU Trying To 'Fix' It?

from the because-it-wants-to-break-it dept

We've been talking about the ITU's upcoming World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) for a while now, and it's no longer "upcoming." Earlier today, the week and a half session kicked off in Dubai with plenty of expected controversy. The US, the EU and now Australia have all come out strongly against the ITU's efforts to undermine the existing internet setup to favor authoritarian countries or state-controlled (or formerly state-controlled) telcos who want money for internet things they had nothing to do with. The BBC article above has a pretty good rundown of some of the scarier proposals being pitched behind closed doors at WCIT. Having the US, EU and Australia against these things is good, but the ITU works on a one-vote-per-country system, and plenty of other countries see this as a way to exert more control over the internet, in part to divert funds from elsewhere into their own coffers.

Hamadoun Toure, secretary-general of the ITU, keeps trying to claim that this is all about increasing internet access, but that's difficult to square with reality:

"The brutal truth is that the internet remains largely [the] rich world's privilege, " said Dr Hamadoun Toure, secretary-general of the UN's International Telecommunications Union, ahead of the meeting.

"ITU wants to change that."

Of course, internet access has already been spreading to the far corners of the planet without any "help" from the ITU. Over two billion people are already online, representing about a third of the planet. And, yes, spreading that access further is a good goal, but the ITU is not the player to do it. The reason that the internet has been so successful and has already spread as far as it has, as fast as it has, is that it hasn't been controlled by a bureaucratic government body in which only other governments could vote. Instead, it was built as an open interoperable system that anyone could help build out. It was built in a bottom up manner, mainly by engineers, not bureaucrats. Changing that now makes very little sense.

Besides, does anyone really think that a process that requires the companies who successfully innovated to funnel money to corrupt governments and/or corrupt state-controlled telcos is going to magically lead to greater investment in internet growth? If so, I've got a prince in Nigeria with 53 $ Million US waiting in a bank all for you.

Neelie Kroes, the VP of the EU Commission and in charge of the EU's Digital Agenda tweeted simply:

The internet works, it doesn't need to be regulated by ITR treaty. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

And that's the thing. The internet works just fine. The only reason to "fix" it, is to "break" it in exactly the way the ITU wants, which is to favor a few players who have done nothing innovative to actually deserve it.

Filed Under: hamadoun toure, itu, wcit

Dear ITU: A Complex Process Where Delegates Who Fly To Dubai Can 'Lobby' Is Not 'Transparency'

from the words-mean-things dept

The EU Parliament recently joined the US government in speaking out against the ITU's upcoming WCIT event, which we've been discussing. This is where the ITU -- an ancient organization designed to deal with telegraphs, and whose relevance today has been widely questioned -- is seeking to take over certain aspects of internet governance, well outside its mandate. Certain countries -- Russia and China in particular -- and certain large telcos (including many EU ones) are looking at this as a way to advance very specific interests, either for increased control and censorship over the internet, or in forcing successful internet companies to fork over money to telcos who have failed to innovate. Thankfully, the EU Parliament has now spoken up about its concerns, noting a number of key points (these are just the first half, but they give you an idea):

1. Calls on the Council and the Commission to ensure that any changes to the International Telecommunication Regulations are compatible with the EU acquis and further the Union’s objective of, and interest in, advancing the internet as a truly public place, where human rights and fundamental freedoms, particularly freedom of expression and assembly, are respected and the observance of free market principles, net neutrality and entrepreneurship are ensured;

2. Regrets the lack of transparency and inclusiveness surrounding the negotiations for WCIT-12, given that the outcomes of this meeting could substantially affect the public interest;

3. Believes that the ITU, or any other single, centralised international institution, is not the appropriate body to assert regulatory authority over either internet governance or internet traffic flows;

4. Stresses that some of the ITR reform proposals would negatively impact the internet, its architecture, operations, content and security, business relations and governance, as well as the free flow of information online;

5. Believes that, as a consequence of some of the proposals presented, the ITU itself could become the ruling power over aspects of the internet, which could end the present bottom-up, multi-stakeholder model; expresses concern that, if adopted, these proposals may seriously affect the development of, and access to, online services for end users, as well as the digital economy as a whole; believes that internet governance and related regulatory issues should continue to be defined at a comprehensive and multi-stakeholder level;

6. Is concerned that the ITU reform proposals include the establishment of new profit mechanisms that could seriously threaten the open and competitive nature of the internet, driving up prices, hampering innovation and limiting access; recalls that the internet should remain free and open;

The ITU has taken to its blog to hit back, claiming that it is deeply disappointed in the resolution. No surprise there. It tries to hit back on some of the points, but fails wildly. Take, for example, its response to the transparency issue:

However, it is important to point out that WCIT is inclusive of 193 national delegations which are participating in WCIT-12. Private sector companies and civil society organizations have also registered to attend WCIT-12 in large numbers.

Everyone attending WCIT-12 is free to lobby for their specific positions.

Added to this, in the run-up to the conference, the ITU Secretariat created a platform to allow any individual, civil society player or company to make its views known.

The very thorough and inclusive preparatory process leading up to the WCIT-12 has been completely transparent. Every European parliamentarian could have obtained all the documents from their own government, or from the European Commission.

At ITU, transparency is achieved at the national level, through national consultations in national languages. Surely this process is far more inclusive than just posting an English language text on a web page?

Note the key false equivalency here: that transparency means that you can have your voice heard (if, that is, you're willing to sign up to fly to Dubai and take part as a delegate). First of all, being heard is not transparency. Transparency is about sharing information in the other direction. It's about making the discussions and details public so everyone knows what's going on. Hearing what people are saying is listening and it's important -- but it's not transparency.

Second, the fact that parliamentarians could obtain the documents is not transparency either. It does not involve the public.

It's this kind of misleading rhetoric that makes people so concerned about the ITU. The fact that it pretends transparency is something other than it is seems like a real problem.

Filed Under: itu, transparency