Strangling of the Free Internet Begins

Editor's Note: For additional details about what Matt Ryan correctly calls a "cocktail of attacks" on the free Internet, please read the series of articles by practicing attorney and Activist Post contributing writer, David Makarewicz.

Dees Illustration

Matt Ryan -- Infowars

AT&T’s pending acquisition of T-Mobile USA has the tech world buzzing with various pros and cons of what this merging would mean for the consumer. Among the pros are the possibility of having a single mobile standard (4G LTE) and a market where phones aren’t restricted to a single carrier. The cons include having less choice between carriers and rate plans, millions of customers suddenly being subject to a more restricted terms of service, and the loss of what T-Mobile customers considered to be a much better overall customer experience.

What’s more troubling, are recent announcements by AT&T to begin capping the monthly usage and impose overage fees on their DSL and U-Verse customers. These customers were originally given a promise of unlimited usage by AT&T only to find an essential mode of communication is now restricted. In a sense, AT&T is forcing their customers to buy in to their cable and phone service to defer the bandwidth used by their online competitors, Skype, Hulu, Netflix, and others.
If you’ve spent time searching for an apartment in the U.S. over the past few years, you may have noticed complexes are beginning to sign contracts with service providers like AT&T, Time Warner, Comcast, and others that forbid their tenants from switching to any other provider than the one they’re under contract with. This deal is offered to landlords in exchange for either what amounts to a kickback or a mock coupon giving their tenants a small discount on service costs. In a sense, you’re subject to your carrier’s restrictive terms and conditions as long as you’re under lease. With some of these contracts, tenants are forced as part of the lease to purchase and maintain a cable and/or Internet service with the carrier. For many in small towns and rural communities where WiMax and other options are impossible, this means you are all but forced to use a carrier’s service, especially when a certain complex is all you can afford.


As we’ve covered here in the past, all signs point to an eventual collapse of the Internet as we know it today. With phone, cable, and web services provided by only a handful select single corporations, more and more Americans are essentially at the mercy of an elite few. AT&T has been in hot water before with privacy advocates, in particular their sharing of private information with the NSA. (Hepting v. AT&T)

This trend to restrict services is even more concerning when coupled with Google and other search engines moves to limit search ranking for news aggregates and other sites they deem to be a “content farm”. This determination is based on the “quality” of a site’s content as determined by the search engine.

Bandwidth is becoming cheaper to the provider, and more expensive for the consumer. This is a complete reverse from what we should expect from any technology-driven industry. In a market where choices are quickly becoming fewer and restrictions on our communication continue to become tighter, it’s becoming clear that communication is becoming both more restricted and more expensive.

Infowars Analysis:
Bottom line, a cocktail of attacks have been launched on the Internet and communication as a whole. The endgame is a transformed Internet run by monopolies that can control access to websites and content, ending the free web as we know it.

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BBC World Service to sign funding deal with US state department

Customers in an internet cafe in Changzhi, China. The US government's investment is intended to help people circumnavigate state censorship. Photograph: Reuters

Low six-figure investment will aim to help combat censorship of TV and internet services in countries including Iran and China

The BBC World Service is to receive a "significant" sum of money from the US government to help combat the blocking of TV and internetservices in countries including Iran and China.

In what the BBC said is the first deal of its kind, an agreement is expected to be signed later this month that will see US state department money – understood to be a low six-figure sum – given to the World Service to invest in developing anti-jamming technology and software.

The funding is also expected to be used to educate people in countries with state censorship in how to circumnavigate the blocking of internet and TV services.

It is understood the US government has decided the reach of the World Service is such that it makes investment worthwhile.

The US government money comes as the World Service faces a 16% cut in its annual grant from the Foreign Office – a £46m reduction in its £236.7m budget over three years that will lead to about 650 job cuts. The money will be channelled through the World Service's charitable arm, the World Service Trust.

The deal, which is expected to be formally announced on International Press Freedom Day, 3 May, follows an increase in incidents of interference with World Service output across the globe, according to its controller of strategy and business, Jim Egan.

BBC Persian television, which launched in early 2009 and airs in Iran and its neighbouring countries, has experienced numerous instances of jamming. The BBC Arabic TV news service has also been jammed in recent weeks across various parts of north Africa during the recent uprisings in Egypt and Libya.

"Governments who have an interest in denying people information particularly at times of tension and upheaval are keen to do this and it is a particular problem now," said Egan.

Another area in which the BBC World Service is expected to use the US money is continuing its development of early warning software.

This will allow it to detect jamming sooner than it does currently where it relies on reports from users on the ground.

"Software like this helps monitor dips in traffic which act as an early warning of jamming, and it can be more effective than relying on people contacting us and telling us they cannot access the services," said Egan.

The BBC also expects to use state department money to help combat internet censorship by establishing proxy servers that give the impression a computer located in one country is in fact operating in another, thereby circumnavigating attempts by repressive governments to block websites.

"China has become quite expert at blocking websites and one could say it has become something of an export industry for them – a lot of countries are keen to follow suit," said Egan.

"We have evidence of Libya and Egypt blocking the internet and satellite signals in recent weeks."

Egan added that the battle against jamming is likely to be an ongoing one because repressive countries are likely to develop methods to counter any anti-censorship technology that is developed.

"It is a bit of a game of cat and mouse," said a BBC source.

Source:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/mar/20/bbc-world-service-us-funding?CMP=twt_fd

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