I am always amazed by the gross ignorance, technically and
legally, of some of the commentators who opine about the Internet. First, let
us define the Internet. Shall we? The Internet is simply a TCP/IP connection
between multiple points. The Internet is an insecure and open network that enables
the connection between multiple points and multiple users. The Internet is NOT
an application of anything.
Historically entities that carry stuff from one point to
another were controlled by bailment laws and then common carrier laws. Bailment
laws meant you were responsible for the content, common carrier laws said you
were responsible only for delivery. no matter what was the content. Now for
centuries common carriage was the way things were sent. Until, of course, the
ISPs decided they wanted to be exempt from it. Frankly a rather dumb idea. So
now we have ISP who not being common carriers have liability for the stuff they
transport. Their choice folks.
Now along come a bunch of Academic who mix apples and
oranges and get marshmallows. In a NY
Times piece they note:
Which leads to a final point: The rules governing the
internet made sense in the dot-com era. They don’t anymore. Today’s online
world was built largely in the early 1990s, when the government opened up the
internet to commercial activity and wrote rules governing its infrastructure.
This included Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which said
that no internet provider or platform could be considered the publisher or
speaker of any information placed on its site by a third party.
The 230 was a back door common carrier protection. But the
author seems to be conflating the transport function, which is all the Internet
is, with the content function. The author continues:
Washington’s hands-off approach ultimately permitted a
marvelous explosion of content and connectivity on social media and other
platforms. But the people designing the rules of the internet didn’t reckon
with the ways that bad actors could exploit the system. The people building
those tools had little inkling of how powerful, and exploitable, their
creations would become.
What is the author trying to say? Really? If the Internet is
just open and insecure transport, then what is the problem. Unless, of course,
the ISP knowingly aides and abets something illegal. The old common carrier
rules made for an open and a bit more secure environment. The Internet was
designed to be as open as possible, and that meant as insecure as possible. I
have designed, implemented and operated secure IP networks, but they were on my
own secure private unshared circuits.
Having the distinct disadvantage of experience, unlike
History Professors, I hazard to say the problem is not the Internet qua
transport. It is the social media players who have disintermediated personal
communications.Try and get the facts straight, please!
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