(For more details on this process, please see the section at the end of this report titled “About this Canvassing of Experts.” Respondents were allowed to choose to share their thoughts for credit or anonymously. Thirty-five percent answered “yes” while 65% more optimistically answered “no.” Yet some who answered “no” wrote in their elaboration on the question that their answer was their “hope” and not necessarily their prediction. For a long time I’ve felt that the utopianism, libertarianism, and sheer technological skill of both professional and amateur programmers and engineers would remain the strongest counterbalance to these restrictive institutional pressures, but I’m increasingly unsure as the technologists themselves and their skills are being increasingly restricted, marginalized, and even criminalized.”, Jeremy Epstein, a senior computer scientist at SRI International, responded, “The extension of copyright terms back into the near-infinite past will reduce what can be shared. They also cited such examples as the theft of customer account details from Target and corporate surveillance of consumers as giving ammunition to those who want to crack down on the content that flows online. Threats Logging interests cut down rain forest trees for timber used in flooring, furniture, and other items. internet as a threat to old media Introduction Just a few clicks on the mouse and a whole world of information are available for free. The challenge, of course, lies in our ability to identify those harms with sufficient clarity so that regulation would be effective without needlessly limiting the functionality of the network.”. Sharing freely will be recognized as having greater long-term economic value than strictly limited controls over ‘intellectual property.’”. While this is particularly important when you are looking for scientific or medical information, it is equally applicable when looking for restaurants, music, or other things that are matters of taste. Visit our corporate site. We call this research study a canvassing because it is not a representative, randomized survey. As today, there will be both good and bad news continually in that area, but over time more integration, access, and sharing will be a driving force.”. © Moreover, the evolution of the modern Internet has led to non-state actors, such as terrorists and hackers, posing security threats to states. This will grow. New York, There are theoretical threats – such as the Kremlin's plans to take control of the .ru domain and take Russia off the global internet during an 'emergency' – and there are real problems caused by governments, such as the 'great firewall' in China. A significant number of respondents predicted that increased monetization of Internet activities will hurt the ways in which people receive information in the future. Several themes ran through the elaborations people shared after these prompts, most of them centered on threats to the current structure and operation of the Internet: The experts in this survey noted a broad global trend toward regulation of the Internet by regimes that have faced protests and stepped up surveillance of Internet users. This is also true for the Internet economy, where we’ve seen some trends of consolidation in various markets. China is known for its “Great Firewall,” seen as Internet censorship by most outsiders, including those in this canvassing. For example, this morning I woke up and didn’t have to get out of bed before Alexa told me today’s weather and top stories and my iPhone gave me a traffic alert that it would take longer than usual to get to my 8AM meeting. The overuse of social media is a global problem impacting all generations, and research has shown that substantial internet usage can have a highly negative impact on our mental and emotional health. Information Technology for Counterterrorism: Immediate Actions and Future Possibilities.Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. At around 500,000 routes – a figure that's increasing by around 1,000 routes per week – the growth of the global internet routing table shows no signs of slowing. It's massively important, but is the net safe? Leah Lievrouw, a professor of information studies at the University of California-Los Angeles, wrote, “There are too many institutional players interested in restricting, controlling, and directing ‘ordinary’ people’s ability to make, access, and share knowledge and creative works online—intellectual property rights holders, law enforcement and security agencies, religious and cultural censors, political movements and parties, etc. Efforts to fix the TMI (too much information) problem might over-compensate and actually thwart content sharing. We've all heard about bugs like Shellshock and the 512k router problem, but are there other menaces that could bring down the worldwide web? It seems likely that steps will be taken to avoid barriers like an end to Net neutrality and the further erection of ‘walled gardens,’ and to keep the dangers of cybercrime sufficiently in check so that accessing content will not be significantly hindered.”, Clark Sept, co-founder and principal of Business Place Strategies Inc., wrote, “Online content access and sharing will be even better and easier by way of personal digital rights access. To complete the subscription process, please click the link in the email we just sent you. Bonus question: Describe opportunities that you expect that will help people realize the fullest potential of the Internet, or describe challenges you expect may stop people from realizing the fullest potential of the Internet. The fact that a few corporations dominate large parts of the Internet is not news. NY 10036. What steps are necessary to block changes that would limit people’s optimal future capabilities in using the Internet? As the economy continues to slide downward, all of these abuses are getting worse rather than better.”, Marcel Bullinga, technology futures speaker, trend watcher, and futurist, said, “Sharing is hindered by ridiculous 19th century laws about copyright and patent. If we aren’t ready to make the courts take ownership of the Net and its implications, then a free Internet is history, since the service providers have no interest in the free flow of information.”. (Image: Wikimedia), Introduction, routers and government censorship, The NSA might be monitoring, but other governments actively switch off the internet, Disasters, security flaws and network outages, Microsoft Teams is getting a new feature you won't believe we've lived without until now, Walmart promises more PS5 and Xbox Series X stock ‘soon’, Google is finally fixing one of Chrome's most annoying issues on Windows 10, Where to buy PS5: all the latest restock updates, Microsoft Teams wants to solve one of the most frustrating aspects of remote working, Why the Samsung Galaxy S21 may last you four years, 7 new TV shows and movies on Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney Plus and more this weekend. Technology consulting firm Gartner, Inc. projects that 6.4 billion connected things will be in use worldwide this year, up 30 % from last year. Suggested Citation:"2 Types of Threats Associated with Information Technology Infrastructure. Both will die away. "Until we secure our cyber infrastructure, a few keystrokes and an Internet connection is all one needs to disable the economy and endanger lives," … It won’t be a bloodless revolution, sadly, but it will be a revolution nonetheless.”, Kevin Carson, a senior fellow at the Center for a Stateless Society and contributor to the P2P Foundation blog wrote, “There’s a lot of work underway now in developing open-source, interoperable, and encrypted versions of social media, in response to the increasing authoritarianism and state collaboration of existing walled-garden media.”, Jim Hendler, a professor of Computer Science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and architect of the Web, wrote, “If anything, it is privacy that will have to give way to openness, not the other way around… Repressive governments will be working hard to stop the spread of information. That means fewer monopolies, fewer lobbyists, fewer licenses, and fewer bribes. There was no explicit counter-argument to this theme, but some respondents’ answers implied that they felt algorithms and analytics and people’s own search strategies would improve and produce a relatively happy equilibrium where people got what they wanted and also were exposed to new ideas and material that they would appreciate. Pervasive criminal activity in cyberspace not only directly affects its victims, but can imperil citizens’ and businesses’ faith in these digital systems, which are critical to our society and economy. That will spur innovation into the extreme. The latter's latest effort is Green Dam, a piece of web censorship software that will soon be pre-installed inside every computer sold in China. Mohammad Ismail / Reuters It is undoubtedly the most reliable machine Man has ever made. The rapid expansion of devices that are connected to the internet and weaved into our everyday life is remarkable. "While there are extreme scenarios like natural disasters and terrorist attacks that can cause disruption to the web, it is actually far more commonplace to see the internet fall foul due to shortcomings with routine maintenance and operations, such as hardware upgrades," says Mike Palladino, director of IP infrastructure and operations at internet hosting company Internap in Atlanta, US. Already access and sharing are hindered by parochial national laws. This time it will be different. Communication networks’ lobbying against Net neutrality is the biggest example of this.”, PJ Rey, a PhD candidate in sociology at the University of Maryland, wrote, “It is very possible we will see the principle of Net neutrality undermined. Some respondents expressed a sense of hopelessness in the face of economic and political forces. And this will trump all other concerns.”, Josh Calder, a futurist with the Foresight Alliance, expressed confidence that threats to Net neutrality will be routed around. A survey that was conducted in 1990 by Equifax (one of the three biggest credit bureau companies in the USA) on the use of technology and the threat to the privacy of people, found that 79% of the respondents indicated that they were weary of the use of technology for the processing of their personal information (Frocht & Thomas, 1994, p. 24). Introduction, routers and government censorship. When participants in this canvassing were asked about access and sharing in 2025 they were also provided with the following additional prompts, to which some replied and some did not: Please elaborate on your answer—Describe what you believe are the most serious threats to the most effective accessing and sharing of content on the Internet. It is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts. With over seven billion people on the planet and approximately 40% of them online, the internet is one of the most important resources to protect, but is it completely protected? "Some of the largest instances of internet outages weren't caused by natural disasters or terrorist attacks, but rather government censorship," says Brian Chappell, Director, Technical Services EMEAI & APAC at the Leeds office of BeyondTrust. At its best, the internet is no threat to our minds. The European Union’s privacy initiative can be a serious bottleneck, and the Safe Harbor regime is in jeopardy. A share of these experts express new urgency about surveillance. The pandemic also lays bare the many vulnerabilities created by society’s dependence on the internet. Governments will become more skilled at blocking access to unwelcome sites.”, Christopher Wilkinson, a retired European Union official, board member for EURid.eu, and Internet Society leader predicted, “Surveillance … at the minimum chills communications and at the maximum facilitates industrial espionage, it does not have very much to do with security.”, Some participants also predicted that regional differences in politics and culture will continue to spawn efforts to hinder access and sharing online. 2. And they said they expect that technology innovation will continue to afford more new opportunities for people to connect. "When the Turkish prime minister banned Twitter, tweets about the ban and from Turkey increased significantly," says Dinah Alobeid at the New York office of analyst company Brandwatch. Commercial pressures affecting everything from Internet architecture to the flow of information will endanger the open structure of online life. Luckily, the country's constitutional court overturned the ban after two weeks. One of the worst dangers of the Internet, for many parents, is the idea that pornography could pop up and surprise their children. Why isn't Nintendogs a mobile game already? As Internet experts look to the future of the Web, they have a number of concerns. Unfortunately, the interests of everyday users count for very little.”, Dennis McCann, a director of computer training in Illinois, formerly a senior technical consultant at Cisco and IBM wrote, “The policy discussions today that are about service provision are mostly with last generation’s telecommunications companies. 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