This is interesting. The spying really isn't done through the Internet but through closed information social media systems such as Facebook and Twitter. It raises some really interesting issues about the difference between open information systems and closed information systems - really a contrast that has always been with us I think, but the Internet as an information system is really changing all that. There has been a great deal of discussion of course of Facebook selling information, but I really hadn't given much thought to differences in how the information itself is translated. It seems like social media has a much more basic packet switching system than say e-mail or longer postings. This would make sense for Twitter which is limited I believe to 140 characters (don't use twitter so I'm not sure). It makes one wonder about the degree to which traditional media is pushing social media as a phenomenon, but not so much other forms of Internet communication. Maybe because it is easier to control. Relatedly, Egypt can't such down the Internet, they can only shut down the end servers that most Egyptians use, which is basically the last routing point for Egyptians. One of the big issues in Net Neutrality is the idea that companies which own specific netowrks, such as Verizon, have complete control over the end point routers for cell phones and their progeny. That means they can control information in much the same way that Egypt is now controlling information, but instead of letting no information through, they would only let the information they wanted thorugh. I think for more complex information where the end user has a choice of networks, this isn't anywhere near as much of a problem. And as Andy suggests, hackers can find other end point servers (I am sure by this point Egyptians have hacked into servers from nearby countries. Hackers in China have become amazingly good at this and it is one of the reasons I think that the government has gone from trying to control the Internet itself to trying to control search engines (I'm not sure how they do this, perhaps by having the search engines not automatically translate to and from Chinese. Maybe somebody else knows). This raises so many questions about information and how we treat information. Michael ________________________________ From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu on behalf of Andy Blunden Sent: Sat 2/5/2011 10:59 PM To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity Subject: Re: [xmca] internet and surveillance I think there must be some law, a corollary of the law about offensive and defensive military technology (that the technology of bullets is always one step ahead of the advance of the technology of armour) to the effect that the hacker is always one step ahead of the internet security expert. Andy mike cole wrote: > This story might be worth thinking about. > mike > > http://internetsgovernance.blogspot.com/2011/02/egypt-crisis-egypt-is-burning-and.html > __________________________________________ > _____ > xmca mailing list > xmca@weber.ucsd.edu > http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca > > > -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Hegel Summer School: The New Atheism: Just Another Dogma? <http://ethicalpolitics.org/seminars/hss2011.htm> __________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
<<winmail.dat>>
__________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca