Whitehouse.gov wants to take away your internetz

[Otto 83]

What type scenario would call for such a act by a president?

[Danno 1,228]

What type scenario would call for such a act by a president?

Good reply, thanks.

As one who is only mildly in tune with the -nuts and bolts- of how the internet works... it seems like one would need someone at the "master switch" (so to speak) to safe guard things, if there is not a need now... certainly there will in the future.

The key to me is that this power would be structured in such a way where it could not drift into some "legal control" power..... perhaps taxing or regulating.

It should be an emergency on/off switch.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

What type scenario would call for such a act by a president?

Good reply, thanks.

As one who is only mildly in tune with the -nuts and bolts- of how the internet works... it seems like one would need someone at the "master switch" (so to speak) to safe guard things, if there is not a need now... certainly there will in the future.

The key to me is that this power would be structured in such a way where it could not drift into some "legal control" power..... perhaps taxing or regulating.

It should be an emergency on/off switch.

The question is, how can one have a "master switch" in the whitehouse? The internet is not a stream that passes through any one choke point, but rather a series of interconnections, a "web" if you prefer. The complexity of the system, and the difficulty with which to actually control the entire US network from a command location, would in essence, create more mischief, of the type such command and control would hope to avoid.

For instance, note the vunerability of the power grid to cyber-attacks. It would take a combination of excessive load and shear luck, to bring down more than regional areas of the grid. Trying to bring down the entire national grid, with all the redundantcies and interconnections, would be extremely difficult, if at all possible.

Edited August 29, 2009 by Mister_Bill