A Declaration for the Future of Internet Regulation
A Declaration for the Future of Internet Regulation
The White House announced on Thursday its official participation with partnering nations to launch the Declaration for the Future of the Internet.
The document, signed by 60 democratic countries, ranging from Albania to Uruguay, represents a commitment to upholding a “positive vision for the Internet and digital technologies”.
The actual purpose of this document is unclear — it’s largely a collection of vague platitudes that could be interpreted in multiple ways, and some of these ways are not so inspiring.
The declaration frames the internet as a bastion of hope and prosperity, wistfully reminds us of the excitement we once felt towards its potential, and then highlights the “risks inherent in that reliance and the challenges we face”. It presents a call to action to “reaffirm and recommit its partners to a single global Internet”.
“A single global internet”. Does this mean “We governments vow not to shut off the internet for our citizens”, or does it mean “we will not allow other internets to fracture off, that have different standards or regulations”?
If we put our slightly more cynical hat on, we might find that the answer lies in the fact that this document began as a Biden administration-led effort, originally known as the Alliance for the Future of the Internet, which was actually about cooperation around internet regulation. A one-world standard when it comes to regulation would not allow people to have options and vote with their feet. Forming regulatory alliances with other countries makes the internet infinitely more controllable. Given the insatiable surveillance appetite of the US government, one might presume that said global agreements would end up centered on keeping applications surveillable, rather than ensuring freedom of use. Prominent US government officials have been consistently outspoken in their intention to weaken encryption and mandate backdoors for many internet services.
Another striking part of the declaration is one of the key principles listed:
Businesses of all sizes can innovate, compete, and thrive on their merits in a fair and competitive ecosystem
It always sounds nice when the government volunteers to step in on our behalf and make sure everything is “fair”. Just remember that they’re the ones dictating what “fair” is, and picking the winners and losers rather than allowing the market to do so. We’re reminded of the following quote from economist Murray Rothbard:
“Monopoly had always been defined, in the popular parlance and among economists, as ‘grants of exclusive privilege’ by the government. It was now simply redefined as ‘big business’ or business competitive practices, such as price-cutting. … [The] regulatory commissions could subsidize, restrict, and cartelize in the name of ‘opposing monopoly,’ … to organize for a far greater share of the pie than they could possibly achieve on the free market.”
A global alliance to support the US government’s own chosen cartels and internet regulatory bodies would be a deft move.
Another key principle listed is:
Infrastructure is designed to be secure, interoperable, reliable, and sustainable
“Interoperable” is a very loaded term here, and to understand its context and why this goal would be a disaster, read this great article in Forbes by Zak Doffman. The TLDR: “Interoperability,” as currently advocated by certain governments, will undermine end-to-end encryption and internet privacy.
When reading this declaration, especially during a time when internet control and curtailing digital freedom seems to be the overarching goal for many governments, it is difficult to accept that it isn’t simply paving the way for more organized and coordinated control.
It’s surprising to us that the EFF responded somewhat favorably to the declaration. The document may pay lip service to privacy and be diplomatically written, as all well-crafted agendas are, but it’s important that we read between the lines and look holistically at the current internet regulation these respective countries are also trying to pass. We’ll take off our cynical hat now.
Elon Sticks the Landing
Elon Musk has bought Twitter for $44 billion in one of the most massive financial acrobatic flexes in recent history - and Jack Dorsey has given him his official blessing.
Over the past few weeks, Elon’s Twitter craze has become media fodder as he went from buying enough shares to become a stakeholder, to going all in with his intentions to buy the company outright and take it private. His actions have caused a stir with much debate about what this will mean both for the social media platform and for free speech itself. Musk has been very direct that his intention is to protect free speech.
In an official press release Musk stated:
"Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated. I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans."
The reason that Elon is intent on making the company private is that, without the bureaucracy that public shareholders add to the mix, a company can move faster and break more things.
There have already been a slew of celebrities announcing their exit from the platform using the #GoodByeTwitter, and these have been met with some tongue in cheek responses.
Musk has made a slew of promises about potential changes to Twitter, including saying that “Twitter DMs should have end to end encryption like Signal, so no one can spy on or hack your messages.” Adding secure messaging for would be incredible, if they’re allowed to do it.
The transaction has been unanimously approved by the Twitter Board of Directors, and is expected to close sometime in 2022.
The Curious Case of John Dobbertin
This week it was revealed that Edward Snowden was involved in the creation of Zcash. According to a video from Zcash Media, Snowden was one of the six participants involved in the original “ceremony” that established Zcash’s trusted setup, and he used the pseudonym “John Dobbertin” to hide his participation.
Snowden told Zcash Media:
“I saw it being worked on by a number of trusted academic cryptographers and I thought it was a very interesting project.”
In a message to Zcash co-creator, Zooko Wilcox, Snowden recently agreed to make his participation public knowledge under the following conditions:
“As long as it is clear that I was never paid and had no stake, it was just a public interest thing, I think you can tell people.”
The Zcash “ceremony” of 2016 is an event that has gone down in crypto folklore as one of the more mysterious events in crypto history. In order to initially set up Zcash’s privacy parameters, a secret key needed to be generated, but the problem is that anyone who knows that secret key would be able to forge coins (note that it wouldn’t actually jeopardize the privacy of Zcash).
So they designed what's called a multi-party computation, known as “The Ceremony”, where the secret would be divided amongst 6 people, and if any 1 of those 6 participants succeeded in throwing away their part of the key, the computation would be secure.
This whole process was, by necessity, very secretive, in order to maintain maximum security. But one of the biggest mysterious was that the real identity of the 6th participant, who used the pseudonym John Dobbertin, had remained unknown… until today. It turns out that Snowden, privacy advocate and renowned whistleblower, was that sixth and final participant. He recounted in his interview with Zcash media:
“When it came to this concept that they needed many people in many places all cooperating in the hopes that just one of them might not be compromised, might not work against the public interest, and that that was necessary for the ceremony to succeed, I was happy to say, ‘sure, I’ll help.”
Fast forward to today: Zcash researchers have figured out how to eliminate the trusted setup entirely, and at the end of May, Zcash will launch their “Halo” upgrade. It is a technological milestone for Zcash and for blockchain privacy at large.
To learn more about the Zcash Ceremony, check out our latest video!
MicroStrategy Sails Ahead With Bitcoin 401(k)
MicroStrategy CEO, Michael Saylor, announced this week that his company will begin offering Bitcoin investment options for its employees’ 401(k) accounts this year.
A 401(k) account is a retirement plan offered by many employers in the US, that allows employees to contribute part of their income to an investment account. The funds are withdrawn from the employee’s pay and are then invested into the funds of their choosing.
MicroStrategy’s plan, which is moving forward with the help of Fidelity Digital Assets, will make the multi-million dollar business intelligence company the first in history to take advantage of Fidelity’s brand new offering — On Tuesday Fidelity announced that they will allow employers to offer Bitcoin investment. Customers have previously been allowed to invest in Greyscale funds that track the price movement of different cryptocurrencies closely, but this new offering will allow consumers to invest directly in the asset itself.
The move was not universally applauded, and the US Department of Labor expressed “grave concerns” at the action. Ali Khawar, acting assistant secretary of the Employee Benefits Security Administration, told the Wall Street Journal:
“For the average American, the need for retirement savings in their old age is significant. We are not talking about millionaires and billionaires that have a ton of other assets to draw down.”
The DOL also cited that FOMO and the speculative nature of crypto is what is making them most concerned. A meeting has already been scheduled with Fidelity to discuss the matter. Indeed, any investment can be risky. If you are thinking of investing in crypto for retirement, be sure to do your research and make the choice that best fits your lifestyle!
Central African Republic Declares Bitcoin Legal Tender
The Central African Republic (CAR) has officially become the second nation in the world to declare Bitcoin (BTC) as legal tender!
President Faustin-Archange Touadera signed the bill, drafted by Gourna Zacko (the Minister of Digital Economy) and Calixte Nganongo (the Minister of Finance and Budget), into law on Wednesday. Rumors about the move had been swirling around the past week. Chief of staff of President Obed Namsio said in a statement that the new law is “a decisive step toward opening up new opportunities for our country”.
The law now makes BTC legal tender alongside the CFA franc, which is still in circulation. The move was not well-received by all, however. In a statement given to Reuters, a BEAC (Bank of Central African States) spokesperson said:
“The BEAC learned at the same time as the public of the enactment of a new law on cryptocurrency in Central African Republic.”
Two of the nation's former Prime Ministers also signed a letter calling the law a “serious offense”.
This move from the Central African Republic has made history and deserves a round of applause. It’s also great to see them adopting Bitcoin with no mandate involved.
By Will Sandoval, NBTV Associate Producer, and Naomi Brockwell.