Skip to content

PEW: Experts say liberty online is challenged by nation-state crackdowns, surveillance, and pressures of commercialization of the Internet

Net Threats

Experts say liberty online is challenged by nation-state crackdowns, surveillance, and pressures of commercialization of the Internet

BY  AND 

http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/07/03/net-threats/

Summary

As Internet experts look to the future of the Web, they have a number of concerns. This is not to say they are pessimistic: The majority of respondents to this 2014 Future of the Internet canvassing say they hope that by 2025 there will not be significant changes for the worse and hindrances to the ways in which people get and share content online today. And they said they expect that technology innovation will continue to afford more new opportunities for people to connect.

Still, some express wide levels of concern that this yearning for an open Internet will be challenged by trends that could sharply disrupt the way the Internet works for many users today as a source of largely unfettered content flows.

The Net Threats These Experts Fear

  1. Actions by nation-states to maintain security and political control will lead to more blocking, filtering, segmentation, and balkanization of the Internet.
  2. Trust will evaporate in the wake of revelations about government and corporate surveillance and likely greater surveillance in the future.
  3. Commercial pressures affecting everything from Internet architecture to the flow of information will endanger the open structure of online life.
  4. Efforts to fix the TMI (too much information) problem might over-compensate and actually thwart content sharing.

We call this research study a canvassing because it is not a representative, randomized survey. Its findings emerge from an “opt in” invitation to thousands of experts who have been identified by researching those who are widely quoted as technology builders and analysts and those who have made insightful predictions to our previous queries about the future of the Internet. (For more details on this process, please see the section at the end of this report titled “About this Canvassing of Experts.” Respondents were allowed to choose to share their thoughts for credit or anonymously.”

Stephen

  • Pro plugin deactivated or invalid

Posted on: July 4, 2014, 7:01 am Category: Uncategorized

By: Stephen Abram

Comments Off on PEW: Experts say liberty online is challenged by nation-state crackdowns, surveillance, and pressures of commercialization of the Internet

0 Responses

Stay in touch with the conversation, subscribe to the RSS feed for comments on this post.