What would life be without the Internet? Imagine if we could no longer watch recaps of our favorite shows, if we can no longer connect with people on social media, or we can no longer have an online platform to express ourselves. It seems unimaginable, we can say that one who has experience on the Internet may never imagine life without it. Now in contrast, imagine if the Internet is free, if porn sites are as accessible as social media sites, or if crime on the Internet is as easy as picking flowers. Those situations seem more possible. Too much the Internet is always bad, but none is no better. So, how can we maximize the use of the Internet, without abusing what it offers? How can we possibly regulate the Internet?
The Internet started in the United States with the military project goal to create a strong computer network that can perform nation-wide and withstand disaster. In the 1960s, the ARPA or Advanced Research Projects Agency developed the ARPAnet to “enable sharing of messages and data among different computers of universities and high-tech defence contractors located at different places in the U.S.”. In the next decades other networks have interconnected themselves using ARPAnet. In later years, many networks were already operating on the Internet outside and inside the US and in the present the network now connects different institutions (‘The Internet and Related Issues’, 1995). Thus, this was the advent of the Internet.
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Meriam Webster dictionary have defined the Internet as “an electronic communications network that connects computer networks and organizational computer facilities around the world”. In lay man’s term the Internet is basically a platform for the online world. The advent of the Internet has made life easier; communication and meeting people have become easier and cost-efficient with different social networking sites.
Techopedia states that the Internet “is the most cost-effective communications method in the world” as it offers email, instant messaging, web-based audio and video conferencing services, social networking, and more. It has also opened doors for business world and has proven itself useful for academic purposes.
Why Is There a Need to Regulate the Internet?
The Internet may have provided services easing communication, business, or education, but it has also given rise to different problems. Problems in content it has become easy to get information about certain things in the Internet, whether good or bad; the Internet may offer information about hacking, making bombs, manufacturing drugs, committing suicide and a lot more (‘The Internet and Related Issues’, 1995), causing people to apply this information illegally or for crimes to commence. One example is the case of Andreaz Lubitz, a co-pilot who took his life with 149 other passengers by crashing a plane in the French alps before the event his iPad has search terms like ‘living will’, ‘suffering’ and ‘dying’ (Davis, 2015).
Nude or pornographic contents are also easily accessible in the system (‘The Internet and Related Issues’, 1995). Where in an article in The Washington Post by Long (2016), pornographic contents serve as a form of ‘cultural violence’, a term coined by Sociologist Johan Galtung, who argues that it is an aspect of culture where it can be used to legitimize violence. In pornographic contents women are being represented as objects and it expands to the mainstream media, where women advertise products where they seem to be objectified and overly sexualized (Long, 2016). Long added that: “There is a growing body of evidence implicating the consumption of extreme pornography in some of the most heinous cases of sexual violence, rape and murder”. Crimes can also stem from pornographic contents. Illegal contents have also become rampant in the world of the Internet.
Problems also arise regarding copyright: with the easy copy paste of information and files online have created conflicts with copyright enforcement. Consequently, issues of copyright infringement and plagiarism online are often unregulated because of the vast sources that can be found online (‘The Internet and Related Issues’, 1995). There is no adequate copyright provisions or laws in the present that would protect all contents available online.
Safety in the Internet system is truly questionable, especially with different social media sites that are available, these social media sites have become tools for bullying, harassment, homophobia, racism and a lot more (Australian Human Rights Commission, 2013). Furthermore, it has also become a tool for committing crime: sexual predators have used social networking sites to hunt their victims, pretending they are younger at age and targeting victims that are at their early teens Elgersma (2017).
Why Is It Hard to Regulate the Internet?
One problem in achieving a thorough regulation of the Internet that can apply worldwide: the Internet has no central power, it is simply not centralized (Parliament of Australia, 2013). Its very nature is worldwide, it does not have a centralized power to regulate everything that the Internet offers. Controlling the information dissemination would also be difficult because of its complexity and its abundance. Certain websites may have regulatory rules and may limit content that they share or post, it helps, but it does not apply to other websites, and other websites themselves are illegal and feature illicit contents that are available to people at all ages.
Anonymity is also a major problem. The source of information cannot be determined because of the freedom to disseminate information or files without the need to issue identity or because of anonymous or pseudonymous accounts or content sharers (Parliament of Australia, 2013). With this credibility is also at stake.
Another problem, why the regulation of the Internet cannot commence is that people with power lacks knowledge about it, without the proper knowledge how can policy makers create and issue laws that can regulate the Internet.
Regulating the Internet
It is possible to regulate the Internet, but it will be a long road to embark on. Like the United Nations, an international organization that sets rules on certain things which countries that are members of it abide to follow it (Kenton, 2019), the Internet should also have a main central power that would set a universal rule and guidelines for all countries to follow (Parliament of Australia, 2013). The United Nations itself can also be this central power, since it has proven its authority to impose guidelines and rules that countries abide to.
The central power should be able to set limits to what content would every type of website should have, what is suitable, and what is not suitable, to be able to categorize content by age of viewer or reader; and to be strict on website on restricting content not suitable for minors and opening their website only to suitable age groups. Websites should also have certain types, to be clear whether content is purely for entertainment, academic, news and others.
Academic types of websites should be limited to guarantee credibility and authenticity especially websites like virtual libraries, dictionaries and even news websites, as they are most likely visited by people.
For credibility and authenticity of websites, the central board should issue an official sticker that would be visible to viewers or readers indicating that the website is approved, without the sticker the website is deemed unworthy, not credible, and unauthentic.
In websites containing sexual, explicit, or crime contents should have a protocol of signing in to be able to view content. Websites should be able to asses and create a ‘sign in sequence’, that can assess people thoroughly, which can avoid lying of age just to access the website or creating pseudo names.
Social media sites should have thorough checking of dummy accounts, repeated accounts, or people lying about information to be able to make a communication platform that includes real people.
These may be general rules, but would efficiently apply inside the country with having a centralized board, adhering to the basic guidelines set by the international board and creating certain laws that is suitable in their area. Like the International law, that is the guidelines of law making for sovereign countries (United Nations, n.d.) these can apply the same way.
The regulation of the Internet needs to start in the government. There is a need to amend the constitution, to adhere to the current trend of the modern world; that should include the regulation of the Internet. Laws should exist with crimes made inside the Internet portal. United States have the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Act into law, which transformed the National Protection and Programs Directorate at the Department of Homeland Security into the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) (Shernan, 2019). The United States have a centralized department that is “responsible for protecting the Nation’s critical infrastructure from physical and cyber threats” (Department of Homeland Security, 2019), which helps in regulating the safety of the nation inside and outside the Internet.
Pros and Cons in Regulating the Internet
Regulating the Internet would create a safer environment in the online world, it can also prevent crimes. And the Internet would be used efficiently by all people of all ages. Together with its efficient and easy communication services the Internet can be a guaranteed source of information and a safe place of exchanging messages.
However, regulating the Internet may pose challenges, such as hindering the freedom of speech, right to information and right to privacy. China, for example, have been criticize for its regulation of the net the government has full control of the Internet as they have managed to block and filter websites (Zheng, 2013). China has managed to block some pornographic sites like Pornhub, foreign social media sites such as Facebook and twitter, and have also blocked the site ‘The South China Morning Post’, that posts news articles. It is good that China has banned or blocked pornographic sites, but banning sites that hinder people the right to information and the right for expression is highly unethical. The Official Google Blog 2010 mentioned by Zheng (2013) state that “Google withdrew from the Chinese market for the reason that claiming that Chinese government’s attempts to limit free speech on the web, combined with other factors”. The Chinese government attempt to take full control of the Internet content in China, but with trampling the freedom of expression and the right to information it leads to just dominating and alienating the public. With these people will not trust the government (Zheng, 2013) and it leads to an unending protest for democracy. The government’s participation in regulation the Internet within the country should focus on the wellbeing of the people no rights should be trampled.
Also, creating a centralized board for the regulation of the Internet would be a hard challenge, as it truly needs experts, manpower and the integration of it in the whole world would depend on which country is a member of it (Parliament of Australia, 2013).
Conclusion
The Internet has provided us benefits that we enjoy: it made communication cheaper and easier, it offered a platform for expression and a platform for business ventures, such as online shopping and a lot more. But, with the benefits it offers, comes with the negativities that it can cause like the explicit contents, pornographic contents, dark contents that may lead to crimes. With these, there is truly a dire need to regulate the Internet.
By creating a central power, and by abiding by set rules the Internet regulation can be achievable. Government body should also participate in regulating the Internet of their respective countries, but with certain limitations. The regulating must not hinder the right of the people to privacy, right to information, freedom of speech and democracy.
In the end the greatest regulating body for the Internet is ourselves, we limit ourselves to what we should see, to what we should ace, to what we should be part of and to know when to get curios, to know when to stop and exit websites that have an inappropriate content. We limit ourselves on what to see, what activity we should do in the Internet, and what information we give out. Parents and guardians should always monitor what children are accessing online, better yet to let them access it with supervision.
References
- Australian Human Rights Commission. ‘5 Current Issues of 'Internet Censorship': Bullying, Discrimination, Harassment and Freedom of Expression’. September 25, 2013. Accessed April 8, 2019. https://www.humanrights.gov.au/publications/background-paper-human-rights-cyberspace/5-current-issues-internet-censorship-bullying
- Davis, Simon. 2015 'The Internet Is Still Teaching People How to Kill Themselves'. Vice. Accessed April 8, 2019. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/nn97jk/how-google-searchesinfluence-suicides-511
- Department of Homeland Security. 2019. “CISA”. March 15, 2019. https://www.dhs.gov/CISA.
- Elgersma, Christine. 'Parents, Here's the Truth about Online Predators'. CNN. August 03, 2017. Accessed April 5, 2019. https://edition.cnn.com/2017/08/03/health/online-predators-parents-partner/index.html
- Kenton, Will. 'United Nations (UN)'. Investopedia. April 03, 2019. Accessed April 15, 2019. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/u/united-nations-un.asp
- Long, Julia. 2016 'Pornography Is More than Just Sexual Fantasy. It's Cultural Violence'. The Washington Post. Accessed April 7, 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/in-theory/wp/2016/05/27/pornography-is-more-than-just-sexual-fantasy-its-cultural-violence/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.fa3120f79cdd
- Parliament of Australia. 2013. 'Can the Internet Be Regulated?'. Accessed April 7, 2019. https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/RP9596/96rp35
- Sherman, Justin. 2019. “How to Regulate the Internet Without Becoming a Dictator”. Foreign Policy. Foreign Policy. February 18, 2019. https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/02/18/how-to-regulate-the-internet-without-becoming-a-dictator-uk-britain-cybersecurity-china-russia-data-content-filtering/
- South China Morning Post. 2014. “China Blocks Thousands More Websites as 'Great Firewall' Targets Cloud Services”. Accessed April 8, 2019 https://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1642977/china-blocks-thousands-more-websites-great-firewall-targets-cloud
- Techopedia. 'What Is the Internet? - Definition from Techopedia'. Accessed April 6, 2019. https://www.techopedia.com/definition/2419/internet
- “The Internet and Related Issues” 1995. Accesed April 8, 2019 https://www.legco.gov.hk/yr97-98/english/sec/library/9495rp05e.pdf
- United Nations. n.d. “Uphold International Law”. United Nations. Accessed April 15, 2019. https://www.un.org/en/sections/what-we-do/uphold-international-law/
- Zheng, Haiping. 2013. Regulating the Internet: China’s Law and Practice. Accessed April 9, 2019. https://file.scirp.org/pdf/BLR_2013032615421340.pdf
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