# The UN wants to regulate the internet?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [May 31, 2012, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648 "2012-05-31T13:42:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Gedd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gedd)
#### Post date: [May 31, 2012, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648/1 "2012-05-31T13:42:56Z")
Story here
[http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/05/30/united-nations-internet-regulation/?hpt=hp\_t2](http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/05/30/united-nations-internet-regulation/?hpt=hp_t2)
> [@](#):
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> The conduit is a little known U.N. agency called the International Telecommunication Union, which coordinates cross-border issues such as radio spectrum and satellite orbits. At the December 2012 World Conference on International Telecommunications in Dubai (bureaucratically titled the WCIT-12) the ITU will consider expanding its purview to the Internet.
> [@](#):
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> Also pushing for international controls are developing countries hungry not only for political control, but also for new sources of revenue. (Allowing foreign phone companies to collect fees on international traffic is one proposal under discussion.)
First, does anyone have more on this? This can’t be the whole story.
Second, I can’t see how having China be part of the decision on if and how the internet would be controlled would be a good thing.
Finally, do you think there should be _any_ kind of worldwide regulation of the internet, and if so what kind?
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### Author:  [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)
#### Post date: [May 31, 2012, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648/2 "2012-05-31T14:25:07Z")
I _love_ how they list it as “little known agency”, but then again I’m in telecommunications. The ITU is a standards body not some sort of jackbooted censor.
Just for kicks here’s the ITU-T wikipage [ITU-T - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITU-T) basically unless you can get a network to work together, either through universal standards or through bridging devices between disparate standards you have a mess.
[Or as they say](http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-T/publications/Pages/recs.aspx)
> [@](#):
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> The main products of ITU-T are Recommendations (ITU-T Recs) – standards defining how telecommunication networks operate and interwork. See below list for access. ITU-T Recs have non-mandatory status until they are adopted in national laws. Levels of compliance are however high due to international applicability and the high quality guaranteed by the ITU-T’s secretariat and members from the world’s foremost ICT companies and global administrations.
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> There are well over 3000 Recommendations in force on topics from service definition to network architecture and security, from broadband DSL to Gbit/s optical transmission systems to next-generation networks (NGN) and IP-related issues, all together fundamental components of today’s information and communication technologies (ICTs).
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### Author:  [@Testy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Testy)
#### Post date: [May 31, 2012, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648/3 "2012-05-31T16:16:45Z")
> [@Gedd](#):
>
> Story here
> [http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/05/30/united-nations-internet-regulation/?hpt=hp\_t2](http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/05/30/united-nations-internet-regulation/?hpt=hp_t2)
>
> \
>
> Second, I can’t see how having China be part of the decision on if and how the internet would be controlled would be a good thing.
>
> Finally, do you think there should be _any_ kind of worldwide regulation of the internet, and if so what kind?
Good God no! In addition to China, lets not forget all the Islamic countries that would be all over this and I wouldn’t care for the way they would censor it. And then there are all the pissant countries that would be trying to make money on it so the local dictator could buy his newest mistress a palace or a fur coat or whatever.
Taken as a whole, I don’t think there should be any controls on the Internet. Who could you trust with the job? I wouldn’t want the US or the UK controlling it either. Even in democratic countries, popular opinion can be swayed and the populace could wind up destroying one of the best things ever invented.
Right now, people can say things to those in other countries that they could never say publicly where they live. Burma, China, and tons of other countries have dissidents that use the 'net to speak out against whatever tyranny they are living under. That would all stop as soon as local governments got their hands on it.
Regards
Testy
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### Author:  [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)
#### Post date: [May 31, 2012, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648/4 "2012-05-31T16:49:32Z")
[WCIT-12 Overview](http://www.itu.int/en/wcit-12/Pages/default.aspx)
Considering the following –\> [Resolution 146 (Antalya, 2006)](http://www.itu.int/ITU-T/itr-eg/files/resolution146.pdf) review of [http://www.itu.int/ITU-T/itr/files/ITR-e.doc](http://www.itu.int/ITU-T/itr/files/ITR-e.doc)
It’s 70 pages of definitions and working group approaches to nextwork harmonization.
Basically the CNN article is yet another American freakout over anything associated with the UN. Or would someone be good enough to dig up what exactly they object to?
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### Author:  [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)
#### Post date: [June 2, 2012, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648/5 "2012-06-02T17:18:47Z")
If you send a radio signal it can cross borders, and so can the internet. But my radio signal can prevent your from being used and that is not true of my internet usage. That is a crucial difference and makes any international control of the internet utterly unnecessary and unwise.
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### Author:  [@desertr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/desertr)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2012, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-un-wants-to-regulate-the-internet/623648/6 "2012-06-04T02:27:16Z")
I really don’t think there \*could \*be any kind of regulation on the internet.