Posted on 07/06/2010 9:40:41 AM PDT by Andrea19
Earlier in the month, Senator Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) proposed the Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act (PCNAA). Simply put, this bill would provide the President with emergency powers to shut down portions of the internet during a supposed “cyber attack.” A recent amendment mandates that the President would retain controlling powers for 120 days, after which Congressional approval is necessary. In addition, this also allows the President to force private businesses to comply and shut down any and all of their Internet network operations. During this period, the government is not liable whatsoever for any loss of sales...
Read more: http://www.atr.org/internet-kill-switch-one-step-closer-a5182#ixzz0sv9RRmSl
(Excerpt) Read more at atr.org ...
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He’s going to save us from the first “cyber attack” in September of this year. We will find that cyber attacks are a kind of seasonal thing, happening every late summer or early autumn in even-numbered years.
I love the graphics; keep them coming please!
I wouldn’t be surprised if certain websites when permanently down afterwards; victims of “friendly fire” as it were...
Why bother permanently shutting them down when you can hit them at just the right times and forestall a First Amendment challenge by claiming the “fire” exception as applied to cyberspace?
And everytime Mr. Lieberman does something (the posturing he did on Obamacare comes to mind) that Freepers like, certain members just go gahgah over the senator, praising him to the rafters. Then reality sets in again.
Forgot to mention he’s already shown his stripes in the restrictions on the press lately, especially in covering the oil spill but also before that in controlling the White House Press Corps(e).
I know what you mean.
Good point.
I’ve read this bill and I still can’t find any “Internet kill switch.”
It requires certain players in the critical infrastructure (as defined by the Patriot Act) to develop comprehensive reaction plans to attack that are designed to prevent service disruption. Using emergency powers, the President can order them to put their plans into action. Aside from that, it does a lot to tighten up the government’s own IT security.
So did I miss something?
I think the issue is what kind of Executive Orders this bill may open the door for; but barring the law of unintended consequences, it may not be Congress’s place to pass an act dealing with the Internet like this one.
Only an idiot or a turn coat would like/agree with the idea that a President should, have a kill switch for/over public discussion in the United States of America.
It is possible the people holding office in Congress, etc., are going to CYA on every issue, no matter how insane it is?
We are lost if we allow the same people to remain in Washington. Impeach them. Remove them. NOW! Later is going to be too late.
The POTUS currently has the power to seize the entire telephone infrastructure in a national emergency.
I would support only a 60day period before Congressional approval is required.
Unfortunately, it's Obama who has control of the "switch".
You're exhibiting blind ignorance here.
First, this law does not allow the POTUS to take control of public discourse.
Second, the POTUS already has the authority to seize the entire telecommunication infrastructure (under DCA) and has had such authority for DECADES.
However, we do absolutely need such plans, and the government does need to protect critical infrastructure.
Right now we are at far, far more risk of having significant portions of our Internet shut down by enemies of our country than by our own government. After all, we still have ways of holding our elected officials accountable, and unless they are going to suspend elections at the same time, shutting down the Internet without extremely good reason is political suicide. If they are going to shut down all forms of media, and suspend elections, it hardly matters if there was a law allowing the government to do a small part of that legally.
The number and size of botnets out there should give some idea of how vulnerable. Antivirus software is helpful, but vulnerabilities are almost always found after they have existed for a while. All it takes is for someone to learn about such a vulnerability that gives administrative access before if becomes widely known in order to stick a bot on your system via that vulnerability. They can usually clean up their tracks reasonably well and if they stop using the exploit before people start looking for it it is very likely the bots will only get found is if they do something. However, it they wait until a specific event, it is very possible to have tens if not hundreds of thousands of computers or more participating in an attack.
All those computers could attack other sites, or do something like search the local or network drives for important personal information and start emailing it or posting it out on the web.
They could cause massive denial of services, shatter people's faith in on-line commerce, open up large numbers of people to identity theft. These are relatively simple attacks that a single person without many resources could perform.
Our government needs to have plans in place to deal with such incident. If a hacker finds a hole and starts having computers at the Bureau of Veterans Affairs start posting the medical records, home addresses, and military records of veterans to various sites on-line, I sure hope they have a plan for shutting things down quickly.
I think we all know that there are both individuals and groups that would consider such an attack on our armed forces to be desirable. We need to have a plan on how to react. The plans have to have enough flexibility to be effective. At the same time, we have to be constantly on guard against giving the government too much power.
The law describes the purpose of the plans, says businesses don't even have to use the government plans (but the plans have to meet certain standards). I remember the plans have to be implemented in part to ensure the continued availability of the service. It sounds to me that this would preclude a kill switch.
Read the bill. It is an attempt to address many of your concerns. It's not perfect, of course, but it should bring some sanity, cooperation and organization to our government's ability to respond to threats.
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