HIDDEN LEVERS OF INTERNET CONTROL

Abstract

Battles over the control of information online are often fought at the level of Internet infrastructure. Forces of globalization and technological change have diminished the capacity of sovereign nation states and media content producers to directly control information flows. This loss of control over content and the failure of laws and markets to regain this control have redirected political and economic battles into the realm of infrastructure and, in particular, technologies of Internet governance. These arrangements of technical architecture are also arrangements of power. This shift of power to infrastructure is drawing renewed attention to the politics of Internet architecture and the legitimacy of the coordinating institutions and private ordering that create and administer these infrastructures. It also raises questions related to freedom of expression in the context of this increasing turn to infrastructure to control information. This article explores the relationship between governance and infrastructure, focusing on three specific examples of how battles over content have shifted into the realm of this Internet governance infrastructure: the use of the Internet's domain name system for intellectual property rights enforcement; the use of ‘kill-switch’ approaches to restrict the flow of information; and the termination of infrastructure services to WikiLeaks. The article concludes with some thoughts about the implications of this infrastructure-mediated governance for economic and expressive liberties.

Keywords:

• Internet governance
• Internet policy
• infrastructure
• communication studies
• politics

Notes

A study of Internet governance research themes is presented in DeNardis (2010).

HADOPI is an acronym for Haute Autorité pour la Diffusion des Œuvres et la Protection des Droits sur Internet, a French government agency which translates in English to High Authority for Transmission of Creative Works and Copyright Protection on the Internet.

See Section 9 of the Digital Economy Act 2010. http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/24/section/9?view=plain (accessed 4 January 2012).

See, for example, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement press release, issued 29 November 2010, announcing a list of 82 domain name seizures. http://www.ice.gov/doclib/news/releases/2010/domain_names.pdf (accessed 4 January 2012).

The text of the US House of Representatives Stop Online Piracy (SOPA) bill is available online at http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/pdf/112%20HR%203261.pdf (accessed 4 January 2012). The text of the US Senate bill Protect IP Act of 2011 (PIPA) is available online at http://leahy.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/BillText-PROTECTIPAct.pdf (accessed 4 January 2012).

See Emergency Petition for Declaratory Ruling of Public Knowledge \stop et al., before the Federal Communications Commission, 29 August 2011. http://www.publicknowledge.org/files/docs/publicinterestpetitionFCCBART.pdf (accessed 1 September 2011).