The episode of shutting down the access to Internet by the internet service providers (ISPs) of Egypt has given rise to a new situation. This situation demands that in case of such future attempts to regulate Internet and damage Internet neutrality, measures must be at place to frustrate such attempts.According to Praveen Dalal, leading techno legal expert of India and a Supreme Court lawyer, there is nothing like an Internet Kill Switch (IKS) and it is just a “Misnomer”. There are many methods through which Internet users can defeat any attempt to regulate Internet access, says Dalal.
Although measures to defeat censorship of Internet already exist and there cannot be a situation where Internet can be stopped absolutely yet time has come to specifically and dedicatedly develop some more effective and direct methods to defeat these attempts by governments.
The growing hunger of tyrannical and draconian governments all over the world to control its citizen’s civil liberties like privacy rights and right to speech and expression should be curbed immediately.
When nations like America are working in the direction of making legislation for allowing an IKS to be used by its President, the trend is going in a wrong direction. The Egypt episode has further fueled the fire for an IKS.
An initiative to fight against measures like IKS would never come from governments. The individuals must themselves develop techno legal mechanisms to defeat any future attack on Internet freedom and neutrality.
