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Vision on the relationship between internet and government
DINL Maart 2015
Introduction
The internet is a technological innovation that touches practically all aspects of our society. In a hundred years time, historians will write about this period of development as being similar to that of the industrial revolution. At that time, the primarily agricultural society was completely transformed. Handcrafts were replaced by machines. This lead to unemployment but also created opportunities and innovation that eventually lead to greater prosperity for all. We are now living through the Digital Revolution. All information is becoming digital and this time its Information Technology that is leading us to new opportunities. The driving force behind this innovation is the Internet. In milliseconds information can be transmitted and processed. This has brought new energy to both the economy and the society as a whole. Shopping, travel, taxi reservation, communications, social interaction and many more facets of society have been transformed.
The Netherlands only relatively recently became aware of the fact that our country finds itself at the centre of this digital revolution, rather than simply being overtaken by events. The basis of the internet is the digital infrastructure that is composed of large bandwidth data transport, network nodes and datacentres with millions of servers. The presence of the AMS-IX (Amsterdam Internet Exchange) made the Netherlands the location of the largest internet node in the world. The Netherlands is an extremely attractive location for these services due to the easy access to high bandwidth internet capacity, the beneficial business climate, legally assured net neutrality and the protection of the European Privacy Laws. Giants such as Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Booking.com deliver their European services from the many large-scale dutch Datacentres. As a result of its strong digital infrastructure, the Netherlands has swiftly become the digital gateway to Europe.
Furthermore, there seems to be a strong correlation between a strong digital infrastructure and economic development. The Netherlands is thus well placed to take advantage of these great opportunities.
Legal Frameworks
However, all technological advances have their downsides, even in this case. New developments also bring new risks such as new forms of criminal enterprise and threats to our privacy. The government is clearly struggling with this issue and its role is as yet unclear. The speed of development has made it difficult for the authorities to assess the true nature of the changes and to find the right regulatory stance. There is a strong tendency to rely upon existing frameworks but this is not a new phenomenon. In the 19th century the first telephones were originally dealt with as sound telegraphs and dealt with under the Telegraph Act of 1854, until the situation became untenable in 1904, leading to the passing of the Telecommunications Act. History repeats itself. Many internet and online companies were identified as providers of telecommunications services and as a result, their activities fall under the Telecommunications Act. Once again, this is causing issues for the wider society. There are no useful frameworks for activities such as detection and enforcement.
In a letter from the Treasury to the House of Representatives, dated 23rd of December 2013, the subject of convergence of telecommunications, media and ICT was discussed as the cause of the development of the internet. But the question is whether this point of view is correct. Is the internet a combination of these three sectors? Or is the intenet a new development that is, in itself, causing major change in these sectors of industry?
It is a fact that the online industry is different in many respects from the primarily vertically integrated world of Telecommunications that found ist origins in telephony. E-mail, Whatsapp and Twitter touch the Telecomms industry, Netflix and Spotify relate to the media, Cloud services impact ICT and the internet also impacts the hotel industry with services such as airBnB and personal transport with Uber.
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The research paper Digital Infrastructure in the Netherlands, The Third Mainport, Deloitte 2013, commissioned by the DHPA, ECP, Rabo and AMS-Ix is available at http://www.dhpa.nl en het 2014 vervolgonderzoek op HYPERLINK "https://www.digitale-infrastructuur.nl" https://www.digitale-infrastructuur.nl
Back to the subject of Legal Regulations. It is strange that we continue to try to apply a 19th century framework, developed for fixed telephony. The many issues of the internet society can no longer be addressed by the dated media and telecommunications laws. Using concrete examples, we will illustrate here how the lack of workable regulations for the online world and the internet is causing issues.
THEME Linguistic Confusion
A study of recent parliamentary history shows that there is a great deal of confusion about the terminology and concepts of the digital world. A confusing range of different terms are used to try to describe the roles, functions and types of activities of internet companies. These terms are invariably missing in the telecom and media regulations.
Examples of such terms are: information services, transmission of electronic content, internet node, internet service providers or regular providers. The term Internet Service Provider is particularly confusing as it is used to generally describe any service that offers access to the internet. The lack of clear guidelines means that everybody has their own definitions for these roles. In the intrinsically abstract digital world, this can lead to misunderstandings and a lack of clarity. For example, services providing access to the internet are considered as transmitters of content in the context of copyright. This suggests a mixed role in the creation and transmission of media such as music or video, as in the tradition media world. The traditional content industry uses this traditional framework as part of its reaction against technological advance, by asserting the complicity of internet access providers in copyright infringement.
In the internet world, there exists a clear and necessary separation between the provision of access to the network and the services offered across the network. This has lead to the principle of Net Neutrality.
THEME 2: Net Neutrality
In 2011 the house of representatives made free and unfiltered access to the internet a fundamental right. In connection with an incident involving KPN, it was realised that access to internet services is associated with the right of Freedom of Expression. This free access is now anchored in the principle of net neutrality, with which the Netherlands has taken the lead in the international discussion about this issue. But the implementation of this principle is causing ever more confusion. The principle of net neutrality is expressed in the Telecommunications Act. In that act, the function of providing access to the internet is not precisely defined, as the distinction is not clearly drawn between provision of access to the internet and the provision of services across the internet. In order to facilitate the implementation of net neutrality, a policy paper was drawn up introducing new terms and definitions that has not made things easier. For example, the recent policy on net neutrality from the Ministry of Economy talks of access services, separate services, specialised services and Content services. A combination of separate services is considered an access service, which is necessary to retain compatibility between net neutrality and traditional telecommunication services and providers. On the basis of such terminological confusion, no service provider is able to decide what tyhey may or may not do under the provisions of the new regulations, without first seeking legal advice. Concrete questions from the industry have been passed on by the Ministry of the Economy to the ACM, who now has to try to deal with them. It would be hard to find a better example of the unnecessary increase in burdens caused by these regulatory stresses.
These issues can be simply addressed with a new roadmap for internet activities that we will introduce later.
THEMA 3: Privacy
The Data Protection Act (DPA) protects our privacy. The DPS clearly described what may or may not be done with peoples data including the rights of those involved to manage how their data will be used, for example the right to be able to review records and oppose usage of that data.
The DPA defines the roles of the Involved (the person whose data is concerned), the Responsible (the party who receives the information directly from the person) and the Processor (the party who processes the information for the Responsible). In the traditional ICT practice, the Responsible has complete monopoly over the data and can decide what can or cannot be done with it by the Processor
However, this is very different to the more complex world of the internet, where there is always a long chain of involved parties. The Responsible dont have any power of the Processors, who have their own policies with respect to their service provision. The online service providers are always making use of the services of others, such as datacentres, hosting services and also the providers of the back end services. In practice, processor agreeements are rarely formalised, never mind their implementation checked. Actively regulating the compliance would constitute a considerable increase in administrative burden. The Telecommunications regulations offer no solutions for this.
A Framework and roadmap that clearly demonstrates how the roles of Responsible and Processor are defined in the world of the internet, including their inherent rights and responsibilities would contribute a great deal to securing the privacy of those involved.
THEMA 4: Duty of Care
In his letter mentioned earlier, Minister Kamp announced an expansion of the duty of care. This must be spread to other providers in the internet value chain. Given the increasing dependency of our society on the reliable operation of internet services, this is not an unusual thought. Quite apart from the fact that it is not at all clear which service providers this should involve, there is also the question of whether the Telecommunications Act should provide the starting point for such a discussion. This could have potentially serious side-effects. For example, the wide casting of a net like the Telecommunications Act could lead to forcing major internet nodes such as the AMS-IX to save, filter and tap all of the information passing through it, despite the fact that the AMS-IX has no proprietary rights over the data and simply provides the connection through which the information passes. This net neutral logistics approach is one of the reasons for their success and gives the Netherlands a strong position in the world-wide internet economy.
THEMA 5: = The DPA seal of approval Safe Internet
Another theme from the previously mentioned letter detailing the vision of telecommunications and the internet is the Seal of Approval for safe internet services for the DPA. Just like the duty of care, this seal of approval seems a logical proposal.
Companies need clarity on the trustworthiness of a service provider and the secure handling of their information. There are concerns about cloud computing and the location of data. Data should be well protected against access without permission. In the old ICT world this was simple to control, as the IT manager of a company had complete powers over their own systems and any outsourced services.
Unfortunately, the term Seal of approval is not well chosen. There are many such seals and certificates available that have little or no actual meaning. These are often based upon a simple questionnaire or given automatically as a result of joining an organisation. There is another major issue: most certificates or seals of approval only apply to one sub-section of a serive provision.
For example: A modern datacentre from which internet services are delivered is often checked many times a year by auditors sent by different clients who each want to know something specific about the safety and trustworthiness of their services. They all conclude that the physical security is in good order, but the data security of the total online service provision is not addressed.
In summary: certification and control of individual parties involved is no longer a good quality control measure for internet services. All involved parties in online chains must be safe and trustworthy in order that the whole, the service that is provided, can be declared to be secure. Every chain is just as weak as its weakest link.
In order to make a chain secure, one must first be in a position to name the individual links. Without the earlier mentioned roadmap and the associated descriptions of the duties of each of the players involved, for example with reference to data security, such a seal of approval or certificate is worthless. All it will do is to cause a great deal of duplication of effort and higher costs, resulting in considerably worsened admistrative burden and a strong chance that the intended goal would not be achieved.
THEME 6: Enforcement and Detection
The lack of a useful framework within which to combat internet criminality eats away at the trustworthiness of the whole digital economy.
Working against Jihadist statements on the internet or removing fraudulent activity its important that those investigating have a clear view on the capacity in which an internet company is acting. Is it a responsible individual who has issued his own statement and is also responsible for the technical implelementation? Or is it a company that just offers the technological infrastructure for others to use? Or is it a company that simply offers access to the internet and must operate net-neutrally?
When comparing judgements, statements etc, it becomes clear that there is little or no consistency in approach. This is not surprising as there is no good overview or definition of the activities that make up the chain of activity.
The proposed laws on computer criminality III offers as a definition the term automated work. This includes all information technology in the widest meaning of the phrase. The question is whether it would not be better to differentiate between the various different types of activity. A criminals mobile phone is something quite different to the central operating facility from which the whole internet can be disturbed; or to the control systems of a nuclear power station.
Political discussions first needs a tool with which it can describe the different roles and activities. This will allow them to balance the rights and duties against the need for enforcement and detection. The social and economic risks of interference and action of regulators can be set more clearly against the risks of threatening the trustworthinesss of the economy. Then term automated work is clearly too all-encompassing to be helpful.
SUMMERY:Time for a new Framework and Terminology
For all important infrastructure in our society, there is a legal framework; for electricity, water, roads, air traffic, media and also communication. But not for the internet. It is no longer viable to see the whole digital economy as a form of communication. The Minister for the Economy already speaks of such a framework in his vision statement of the 23rd December 2013, which he calls the Internet Value Chain. The ministry has taken the first step and that is to be applauded. But the suggested model is not sufficient to the task. A truly good framework, let us call it The Data Act is now needed. This would allow us to deal with the debates about what is good and bad about the internet. With a Data Act, we can create better agreements across the whole online world. We can clearly specify which rules and responsibilities apply to whom. With a good Data Act we can set the stage for the Netherlands to gain a lead of decades ahead of our competitors in the world of the Internet.
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