The Iron Curtain for the Internet: Russia will disconnect itself from the global network

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The creation in Russia of our own sovereign Internet, isolated from the global web, some of our fellow citizens consider an undoubted blessing, others - a nightmare that can not only destroy the right to freely receive information, but also slow down economic and cultural development of the country.





Why does Russia need its own Internet?

They started talking about the need to create their own Internet in Russia as soon as relations with the West began to rapidly deteriorate. The starting point was the year 2014, when Crimea reunited with the Russian Federation, and a civil war broke out in the Donbass. The USA and Western Europe imposed economic sanctions against Russia. And then they started talking about the risks that the “digital dependence” of our country entails on the global web.

It is clear that transnational Internet is primarily an American product. And the United States fully controls the global network, possessing the most diverse possibilities for using this control in order to pressure other states. Therefore, supporters of the sovereign Internet are convinced that digital independence is an integral part of the real political sovereignty of the state in the XNUMXst century.

There are not many countries in the world that have their own special Internet. In this list - almost all the so-called “Rogue nations,” including Iran, North Korea, and Cuba. In addition, China has its own Internet. Beijing sees digital sovereignty as the most important way to ensure the country's information and communication independence from Western influence.

Will Russia replenish the number of states fenced off from the global web? Now the Russian authorities, in cooperation with leading telecommunication companies, are working on the implementation of the concept of digital sovereignty.

The basis of this concept is concern for the security of the Russian information and communication infrastructure. For this, it is necessary, first of all, to ensure the storage of huge volumes of data of Russian companies and citizens in Russia itself. Now foreign companies (and where there are companies, there are special services) have the ability to collect, store, organize data on Russian users outside the country. You can imagine what risks this poses for the country!

On August 1, 2018, Russia's plans to create a sovereign Internet, which could cover not only our country, but also China, India, Brazil, and other states, were officially announced. Technical capabilities, by the way, are for this. True, you will have to worry about creating your own software and equipment, creating your own domain name system.

The “advanced” Russians are afraid of isolating the country from the global web no less, if not more, than raising prices for food or housing and communal services. But a number of states quietly exist with a sovereign Internet and this does not particularly affect their economic development.

Golden shield of the Middle Kingdom

For more than fifteen years, the Golden Shield has been operating in China - an Internet censorship system that is considered the most effective in the modern world. You can use the Internet in the Middle Kingdom only by telling the system all the authentic data.

Facebook, Twitter, YouTube in China are not available, but this does not prevent China from leading the global online business. More than half of the population of China, and its population, we recall, is 1,3 billion people, are Internet users. We are all well aware of Chinese online stores trading with the world. So, the sovereign Internet in no way became an obstacle to the economic development in the Celestial Empire.

The order in the Chinese web is monitored by a special cyber police, whose tasks include not only the fight against illegal content, but also monitoring political loyalty of Chinese users.

Internet controlled by ayatollah

Own independent Internet is also being developed in Iran. In this country - more than 46 million users. Many sites in Iran are banned, and this is not only about the resources of the Western media, but, for example, about sites such as YouTube or Twitter.

Iran rightly fears provocations from the United States, interested in the decomposition of Iranian society and considering the Internet and social networks as one of the key tools. The deplorable experience of the Arab Spring of 2011 taught Iranian leaders a lot.

Nevertheless, the Islamic Republic has not yet been able to completely disconnect from the global web. With the help of VPNs, “advanced” Iranians can still visit Western information resources. Of course, the police are trying to track this, but the Iranian law enforcement officers have not yet been able to act as effectively as the Chinese.

Liberty Island: high prices and the black market

Cuba is trying to protect its interests from the harmful effects of the global web through targeted price increases for Internet services. Thus, they are almost inaccessible to a significant part of the Cuban population. To visit a foreign site, a Cuban must pay a quarter of the country's average monthly earnings for one hour of work on the network. Naturally, the vast majority of citizens do not have that kind of money.

Many foreign resources, including the same Wikipedia, are prohibited on Liberty Island. But Cuba has its own Internet, albeit very slow, and much less saturated than the global web.

Unlike China or Iran, the Cuban authorities are blindly watching the existence of a shadow market for information and communication services, which sells popular TV shows and computer games. The main thing is that young Cubans do not get involved in politics, and the Cuban authorities are little interested in gaming or movie piracy.

Kwanmen: the Internet under the flag of Juche

Perhaps the coolest sovereign Internet is North Korean Kwanmen. It differs from all previous systems in the complete lack of connection to the global Internet and, accordingly, the absence of censorship. There is simply nothing to censor at Kwanmen - there is no and cannot be forbidden content.

The number of sites on the North Korean Internet is as limited as possible - according to various sources, there are approximately one to five thousand resources. In fact, Kwanmen is a large electronic library connected to e-mail.

However, certain categories of DPRK citizens still use the real Internet. These are scientists, engineering workers, employees of government agencies. But there are very few of these "chosen ones" and security services are closely watching them.

Thus, having a sovereign Internet is not fiction. But is Russia worth taking an example from the DPRK or Iran? If you do something like that, then in extreme cases - according to the Chinese scenario.
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  1. +1
    26 March 2019 20: 49
    The law was passed. Now youTub will be turned off and there will be no one to scold the authorities. "And the casket just opened."