NEWSLETTER no 4

REFLECTIONS ON THE DIGITAL SURGE

Here you see my most recent computer build, a Socket1700 with Windows11 and a small AI capacity. It is working well as my online computer. To its right, you can just make out a 10-year old build with Win10 and never a hint of trouble. My third active computer Socket1200, runs linux on an experimental basis.

There are unsatisfactory features in the new build. The case is designed for gaming so it has LED lights flashing around the 6 or 8 fans. The internal arrangements, wiring, etc, are difficult to follow at build, but it nonetheless functions well.

Beyond this, in coping with the internet for example, my abilities do not meet the demands of the web; it is beyond my control. External sources find it much too easy to place things on my computer or upload data without my knowledge. In short computer tech has almost completely outmanoeuvred me. So the comments that follow are based primarily on my understanding of society and its politics, rather than on technical expertise.

Many of us are familiar with the use of ‘Teams’ and ‘Zoom’, and smart phones of course, to enable so many and various activities especially when, as recently, normal routines were interrupted by the pandemic or even by unemployment surging. This development has brought digital processes to the fore in the public mind. That is very important and sets the scene for the following remarks.

It is well known that George Orwell spotted the interactive capabilities of television in ‘1984’; that ‘Big Brother’ can address you personally and tell you what to do while you keep your television on. Today, though current attention is more focused on the collection of personal data and its transfer to government or elsewhere, the possibility of personalised instructions emanating from the state is not much further away.

But the most commonly recognised perils of interactive systems based on telecoms and television broadcasting have related to interventions by private third parties, either hackers or social ‘miscreants’ seeking to either to cause damage to systems or to lead the young, or others, into trouble, possibly financial, possibly social. I do not know current figures but the scale of the ‘dark web’ is reputed to be enormous. Many inform me that the extent of the WWW and its hosted activities is impossible to determine but I doubt this; the data is just not disclosed.

One result of these changes has been the recent calls to ban smart phones from primary schools and by implication from children of that age. I agree with this. Driving licenses are not issued before the age of 17 and consumption of alcohol is again restricted for the young. With regard to mobile phone use and other computer based activity ‘ban’ is too strong, but for primary head teachers to be encouraged to discourage smart phones would be a good idea. Already legislation is taking steps in this direction and not surprisingly for the undesirable backdrop to all internet activity is now extremely troublesome.

Yet a note of caution is in order. If children struggle to learn to read, write and use numbers, then anything that draws their interest in here is surely desirable. This consideration seems sensible and should not be neglected. But it is not altogether well conceived: learning takes place in stages and at primary school level the focus should be on the immediate environment and physical activity within it. I myself have never used and do not intend to use the major social media facilities on the web.

Secondary school is time enough for the digital world, for the new digital world poses a challenge to all of us. My view of learning is that it is a process that takes place in progressive stages. Thus the child’s learning ought to be focussed on his or her relationship with the immediate physical world. Learning about ulterior realities, whether of the telephone and television, or those more complex ones of digital processes and the social worlds incorporated within, is a considerably more complicated register, for a later, secondary, age.

In an exactly parallel manner, tertiary education again brings in new registers of understanding. The challenges and opportunities here are formidable. The Internet may give me information on some matter within a short space of time, whilst, in a previous era, it took me hours to go to a library, find the appropriate book and thus acquire the information I needed.

Yet my tentative conclusion here is that the digital world is of infernal complexity and all of us, whether technically expert or not, will be leaning for some time to come. A stand-alone computer is all very well; but most digital activity is now online by means of a smartphone and the WWW. If you make a purchase online, three parties are involved, yourself, the retailer and your bank or alternative payment agent. This is not simple networking, if only because of the need to ensure security. The recent cases of the CrowdStrike outage and the Post Office/Fujitsu scandal are indicative of how far we still have to go to get safe networking.

But just consider the home for a moment. One person alone is likely to have, beside the TV, a computer and a mobile phone; if we disregard the extent of computer-related equipment in the car or other vehicle. A family household will have several computers, mobile phones and a mass of IoT and networking equipment including cabling and hubs for wireless connections. And all this is connected up to outside locations which may be able to intervene ubiquitously. TVs too have internet and computer interfaces. Mastery of all this equipment is likely to be demanding. Software only appears to give us simple interfaces; but ‘at a click’ or ‘a few clicks away’ are easily found guidelines providing unreliable advice that is likely to lead you into trouble, if only that of making an unwanted payment. The flood of advertising is beyond tolerable limits. But the danger is more insidious: email attachments and malevolent websites also menace us. My experience suggests that a computer online is wide open to external downloads; and there are frequent uploads being carried out which are not made on my instructions. And the extent of the malevolent web is a cause for concern, for it does not accord with everyday social experience, which is perceived as relatively ‘safe’,

My point here is that with the new devices we are taking on far more than we bargained for and a long pause and cautious progress is called for. Even relatively simple tasks may require more knowledge and understanding than is anticipated and caution, awareness and preparedness are in order. Apply the same guidelines to the child or adolescent’s learning.

Now think beyond the household for a minute. Here at once the small firm or office with just two or three branches is dangerously exposed to external online interventions. Maintaining digital systems and connectivity is likely to be more complex and costly than anticipated or budgeted for. The challenges that today confront a small business, given the complexities of the digital world, may all too quickly be overwhelming.

Myself I do not have solutions to the challenges of the World Wide Web. But if I can sketch out some of the main features at issue, that may be helpful. The first thing to say about the web and related matters is that it engages human interest. It is part of the social scene and a concern for government. So it is thereby part of the social system and cannot be left to technicians. Issues make their presence felt at once. Which social system for instance. The WWW transcends national boundaries and the state governments to which social systems are bound.

In the ensuing paragraphs, I shall look a little closer at some of the points I have touched on above, including governance. The two matters of central practical concern – firstly data holding and storage and secondly the interactive side of data including IoT and AI, I shall tackle in more depth in later parts.

THE DIGITAL SURGE

The surge in digital development largely emerged from the USA, Tim Berners-Lee notwithstanding. With its control over the hardware, and software in the end, the USA achieved dominance and its pre-eminent digital corporations go beyond monopolies in terms of their power, extent of control and earnings. Microsoft does well with Windows; yet its only competition is Unix-based either in the form of Apple or as found in the intractable, not to say garbled, Linux. Competition from other countries is only slowly emerging.

Inter-government conflict in relation to the internet is increasing. China, having entered the arena as a USA client engaging in manufacturing, is now seen as a competitor with menace. Germany, Israel and the EU are all posing challenges. Concerning IP (intellectual property) in the digital sphere, it may be noted today that the Australian government has just gone into a legal battle with Facebook. It is passing legislation to make Facebook and others pay newspapers for reader access to news articles over which the newspaper retains copyright and to which Facebook etc. provide links at present free. The EU has issued many challenges to the US corporations, especially over monopoly powers. Russia is problematic as we only hear about its alleged hackers and other malicious agents and not about its own digital development.

Russia is still illustrative of many problems. The messaging program Telegram, currently in the news, is headed by CEO Pavel Durov. Durov is a Russian-born billionaire, but now a French/Emirati citizen; he fled Russia in 2014 over Russian state demands for information on Ukrainian members of his previous program VKontakte. He is resident in Paris while Telegram, is registered in BVI but its operations are based in Dubai. Telegram claims nearly 1 billion members and the arrest relates to allegations of abuse (usual suspects). Thus Telegram operates through several states and is responsible to no single government. Macron was responsible for the arrest; Moscow has protested; Musk has protested. It is noteworthy that when Putin invaded Ukraine, he cut off its networks with Russia; they were however quickly replaced by the USA’s Starlink program through the aegis of Elon Musk.

The intricacies of the matter may be further illustrated by the example of the German telecoms agency the Bundesnetzagentur, which is currently demanding oversight of providers of messaging and email services. In the past it has had responsibility for the telephone network. Now it wishes to include service providers such as Google and Facebook. This body is taking its case to the ECJ; if it wins, the implications are huge. By demanding that these services generically be registered in Germany, it will gain regulatory oversight over many details of their functionality including security and privacy; all will be within its brief. This is legitimate; the sovereign state has full authority over local communications.

From a different perspective, China is witnessing growing conflicts between its own internet corporations who do not want to hand over data and the Chinese government which is demanding everything. A mobile phone can trace a person’s movement relatively accurately, but GPS can do so better. But who should control this data? At present the internet is being directed towards facilitating the management of global society. But it cannot be done. Further it should be assumed that no device attached to a telecoms system whether landline or wireless is safe against external intervention. Both state security and hackers have access to software that will enable intervention on any device you or I may own. Within the USA, there is less evidence of corporate/government conflict – a sign perhaps of complete accord in their activities.

It is interesting to note that countries are widely found to use either own language keyboards or keyboards that can switch between English and own language with ease; China, Russia and the Arab-speaking world may be mentioned, I myself can only use one alternative keyboard, French.

The issues involved in regulation can be seen quite clearly in relation to data movement. It cannot be regulated by single national governments with regard to their own territories because the traffic is excessive and complex. Microsoft has or is building a transatlantic cable. Should all movement along this cable be subject to government scrutiny? It is scarcely even possible to demand that each country‘s data is held within that country alone. The cable is US property. But once it touches land in another state, does jurisdiction lie with the second state or the originating state? And if Microsoft for example owns a large data centre in the second state, should jurisdiction lie with the second state or the originating state?

If a transatlantic cable such as Microsoft’s is owned by any of the other major tech companies, there is an evident danger that its data will be shipped back and forth from USA to UK. Microsoft tells us that it has server farms or data centres established in the UK and so the separation between states is reliable. The danger remains that the UK government has no authority over data belonging to UK citizens. This problem may arise between any two countries in the world. Currently it stresses the US government with regard to American data that may be transferred to China as in Tik-Tok or Huawei.

That point emerges as a government concern but the personal concern is also important. So the danger is two-fold: data may be transferred not just to the tech firm and by sale to its clients, but also to governments (in the plural).

It needs to be asserted directly and forcibly that the World Wide Web is not an instrument that extends or enhances democracy. It is an instrument of totalitarian control as George Orwell foresaw. All data placed on the web and all transactions conducted through its systems can be observed by outside parties of which the most capable are government espionage and security systems, only matched by the very large digital technology corporations. In this regard it should be recorded that Microsoft is engaged in Court battles with US government, not to mention the EU or others. It seeks to protect clients’ data from government prying. If encryption is seen to be effective, government will protest.

Furthermore, all domestic computers are open to backdoor intruders. Any website can contain hidden code that can work on a private PC. Cookies can contain code far beyond the functions normally accepted for cookies. The claimed democratic pretensions of the web are false; the web is a powerful instrument of social control. It works by harassment, through spam, malware, targeted advertising and offers scope for fraud at every opportunity, not least in financial matters. It can be used as a channel for harassment way beyond the level of the telephone.

Moreover ownership is brought into question. The principle of the hyperlink is to diffuse control and thus damage property rights. The owner of a site can no longer be sure of owning it. The owner may manage content; but in the end the webhost (whose structure itself may be unclear) owns the site and the long-term consequence may be that the webhost owns the originating business. But the webhosting structure may not be clear. The WWW now requires security certificates and this creates a new form of control.

When the World Wide Web began it was widely lauded for the freedom of expression it allowed. Today however, much that is posted on the internet and its sites has come under criticism for its abuse of free speech. This includes expressions of violence and other aspects of fascism, such as racism, pornography and paedophilia and much else besides. These areas of activity are extensive and unfortunately widely used; the dark web extends inappropriate use of the web to malware dissemination and illegal commerce such as drug trafficking. But the fact that almost no socialist thought appears on the web suggests there is censorship at work; and it works on behalf of the political right. The enormous body of triviality on the web begins to look suspect.

I discuss some aspects of data privacy and control below. But one consequence of the above point is that the structure of the web is now such that the USA government has access to all data and transactions available on the web. I think there will be a fight back but it will be weak and limited.

It is necessary to emphasise how flawed the internet is. A communications system on a global scale cannot be allowed to be biased or partisan in any area. To create a WWW under the control of one country and covertly managed by that country, in terms of what communications are allowed to flow and what not, is to fail to create a universal system. The WWW is designed to be an enormous spider’s web. If you are not on it you are nothing, you are expendable. If you are on it, you are known to the US government.

So at present that endeavour to be universal has failed. As a result, we are seeing different states each setting up its own controls in terms of censorship and other prohibitions. If the WWW is to succeed, it must function according to universal principles. Yet the challenge is insurmountable: The principle of no censorship, or at least no political censorship is unachievable. Abolition of interventions of a malicious type; again unachievable. Seditious words against one state may legitimately be banned by that state; but they are more than likely to be pressed by another. There is an issue here of some substance.

The primacy of social structure in relation to the internet and web underlies the following discussion. The sheer scale of change in the technology of communications in recent years can only be expected to have an impact on the constitution of a state and on the political system directly and it is necessary to be alert to the danger contained in this possibility: the internet and web should be seen as systems of control. The Internet and the World Wide Web are today’s vehicles of communication; but they are now recognised as having major faults. The objectives of the early Internet included uncensored and free passage of communications. But these goals have long since in practice been lost in the ideological and political conflicts between states and in abuse of these facilities by malicious or criminal agents.

Internet and computer management cannot be left to the technicians alone. Parallels between the old, pre-digital world and the new should be recognised. Malware is a problem on the Internet beyond the limit of the tolerable; yet it replicates what was possible before. The telephone could be used abusively and is today again, excessively. Even door-step cold calling has been a problem in the past and nuisance callers are emerging again today. These developments should not be ignored, for they make evident the breakdown of civil society. Malicious activity on the Web is a human activity not a technical problem

The problem may be put like this. The Internet and World Wide Web are structures of communication. But these new structures have flaws beyond the tolerable. Most of my communications will be on a person to person basis; and I will want to know about the receiver’s response to my communication. Further that communication is not for third parties. Nor should it be vulnerable to breaches by third parties. Neither of these conditions are fulfilled at present and therefore the Internet fails in its primary purpose. It cannot be overemphasised that the Internet, like the telephone, is a system of communication and communication is a two-way process. Once the reciprocity of communication fails then the communication system has failed. This is the condition of the Internet today. If I send out a message and there are interventions in my communication, as e.g. all replies are blocked, or messages overheard, then that communications system has failed.

I shall come on to the details of these matters later but let me start with a skeletal history of communications and exchange in simple terms. For a study of past arrangements may give us some clues as to future development. Yet past structures may prove to be wholly inadequate for future governance,

ISSUES OF GOVERNANCE

It is clear from the above discussion that the issue with the web is governance. The necessary expertise demands more than just brilliant maths or other technical expertise, but it is still finite. There are not many well designed websites. To work technically is one thing; but for a user to navigate it with ease, is less often achieved. I try to keep the design of this site as simple as possible: there are no cookies; and there is no advertising.

As with the world of communications, governance concerns the authority that controls it. But, one must insist, all exchange is, to a point, uncontrolled; it is a matter between two parties and further control is an extraneous factor, even if attempts at control are often made. One significant implication is that the parties to a communication have a responsibility; if either party is negligent, the process breaks down. A second significant consequence is that third party interventions may be expected. It is not responsible to set up an organisation such as one of the social media websites and expect the machinery to function without regard to the social responsibilities. This expectation of machine automation is one of the most frequently found goals of technicians but it seldom is able to exclude human responsibility. Not even AI can do that and misuse of any digital technology involving deception for gain or harm is fraudulent and criminal.

In the past, with regard to telecoms, two international bodies set rules: the International Postal Union (1874 at Berne) and the International Telecommunication Union (1865 at Geneva), The IPU, under its current name the UPU (Universal Postal Union), has been criticised for its rules being obsolete, the problem being apparently that they work to the advantage of developing countries. The ITU today par exemple determines technicalities of telephony. The G2, G3, G4 and G5 standards are approved, though not developed, by the ITU.

Individual states have their own bodies for these purposes. The USA has the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) to oversee all cable and wireless communications within the USA, generally inter-state; and also communications to and from the USA. The bodies responsible for the internet are in substance the American ICANN, W3C and Nominet. ICANN sets the address system covering both the original 32-bit IPv4 and the expanded 64-bit IPv6. Nominet UK handles registrations for UK domains including ‘.uk’ and ‘.co.uk’. A further body, the Public Internet Registry which controls registration of ‘.org’ names, is in process of being sold by the Internet Society to private equity in the form of Ethos Capital. This is clearly wrong in principle and forces into public view important questions about the ownership and management of the Internet. Capitalism should not control the registration of names that are likely to include many non-capitalist organisations.

Further bodies take an interest in these matters: WTO and NATO to start with. The WTO in the digital sphere is mainly concerned with IP rights and clearly this area of interest extends more widely than the digital. But it is also developing a position on the transfer of data from country to country and this has growing significance. NATO focusses on malware and cyber attacks. Here there is a problem in tracing the sources of attacks; the use of fronts to conceal the real origins of an attack may throw NATO itself into confusion. Others are emerging. As reported by the Financial Times on 27/9/24, the USA’s FCC (Federal Communications Commission) has supervisory powers over some if not all the satellites in low orbit. Of these Starlink (owned by SpaceX in turn owned by Elon Musk) runs over 6000, all sent up within the past 5 years. The European Space Policy Institute also has an interest in the matters.

It is clear that today’s digital developments demand considerable advance over past procedures that were effective in regulation. None of the established bodies are up to the issues of the new digital world.

Yet development of the WWW and Internet should be in principle under government-sponsored and UN-connected bodies and not dominated by industrial corporations. It cannot be over-emphasised that governments contain elements of democratic process and are subject to public scrutiny and audit; corporations with audited accounts are subject only to minimal scrutiny and many have buried important matters in unscrutinised zones, whether private equity, off-shore accounts or where-ever.

But many covert bodies whether state or hacker appear also to take a close interest. States seek to intervene in Web processes both for purposes of control such as censorship or in relation to subversion as in sponsored hacking. It is claimed that there is no means of control and no over-riding authority; that you cannot even know how many websites there are. But there are means of properly managing such a network – they depend on complex computers and specially designed software and this is beyond lay knowledge not least my own. These are matters that need to be looked into further, and more information should be in the public domain. Should a nation’s constitution specify rules with regard to modern communications?

This has implications for the structure of the state in a globalised world and it is this matter I wish to consider. The technical advances since about 1900 have enormous implications for communications over increased distances and, as a further result, aspects of the structure of the state begin to appear in a new light. The question therefore must be asked: what are the implications of contemporary communications for the structure of the state? And how are global communications to be managed?

These points need to be investigated. In the contemporary world where large scale structures are familiar, old models of communications are obsolete. Many corporations still work on the assumption that communication is between line manager and subordinate. Horizontal communication is disapproved. This is wrong – both horizontal and vertical communication are needed. Team work and group work may be introduced, yet the hierarchy remains all important. For an employee not to know the salary of a colleague is still a common occurrence today. And for no procedure of communication to be recognised when materials pass from department to department in the manufacturing process is dysfunctional.

Germany and China are two states that have both asserted their independence and autonomy in relation to the Web and in the case of China the USA is challenging China’s assertive autonomy forcefully. It is clear that all modern communications dilute state borders. The sovereign state is challenged to control modern communications whether telephone, radio, television, or World Wide Web.

Historically, political theory has always treated of the city state as the fundamental community in which political organisation takes place. But the development of two distinct state structures, that of the local state (whether city, dukedom, or nation) on the one hand, and that of international trade on the other, occurred in the era of the Roman Empire. It also paralleled the emergence of the nation state at a later date in Europe. The Mediterranean was the main centre of commerce in the classical and early Christian world. The Silk Road was perhaps the first great international trade route, but its governance is unknown to us. The Hanseatic League of medieval Northern Europe may be similar. A more recent innovation in international trade is the oil or gas pipeline. And of course the most recent communications innovation is the Internet and undersea cable, though mobile phone and satellite or tower are not insignificant. There is needed an authority in this regard that is not at present to be found.

The physical structure is fundamental. For he who controls the physical structure controls the communications. The 20th century saw the spread of telephone cables on a gigantic scale; and also of the control structures through which the telephone companies manage the cables and the activity through them. Today new submarine cables are still being laid. Besides that already mentioned in relation to Microsoft, there are new submarine cables, owned by Vodafone in SE Asia, under the ocean; by Google and Orange working together to lay a new cable across the Atlantic from USA to France. Google altogether is currently laying seven cables. There are issues of security about cabling, from both external physical interference and from internal software interventions.

Wireless constitutes a different form of transmission. Parallel but different problems arise in relation to range of transmission, security of content, and mode of use, not to mention allocation and use of spectrum.

In general terms, communications need more study. Sociology in broad practice is focussed on structure – the hierarchy of social classes and specific institutions like schools, workplaces, and bureaucracies. But the structures, and especially the processes of communications are largely ignored (except for the Press but the focus of study is the organisation rather than its daily product).

One may quickly list some systems or modes of communication: Post Office, BBC, other radio and TV, regulatory authorities, non-public radio and TV, telephone, whether BT or other telcos, mobile, and non-regular modes of publication outside the realm of print, as on the Internet.

One must always remember the scale is global. And it is this dimension that causes these developments to give rise to a new set of issues. Communication is always systematic; that is, it only arises where two parties are present and, further, a procedural code is necessary for communication to be effective. Even in a very simple instance, communication can break down; for example, if one party fails to follow procedures even for reasons of absence or negligence, let alone mischief. Further communication is normally between two autonomous parties; it is not necessarily part of a chain of command. With the telephone, there are two parties, the caller and the receiver. There is or could be a third, the telco or the tapper. Either could record a conversation between the two main parties, or otherwise intervene. It is the same with email.

Further all international economic activity has a political dimension on account of increased use of economic weapons – sanctions and boycotts. My view at this point in time is that IT has gone through a ballooning process not unlike galloping inflation. It has distorted an already flawed financial system out of proportion in relation to the material and human needs of the world’s peoples. It should be approached with caution; both aspects the technology and the social/political have enormous implications and there is much learning here for everyone.

I shall continue this discussion in further comments from time to time. A second part will focus on data, its management and regulation. A further part three will give more attention to matters of digital governance. Lastly those very contemporary topics of IoT, Crypto and AI will be given attention.

Peter Collier, October 2024

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