Is the USA Giving Up Control of the Internet?

I didn't realise that the USA had any control of the internet.

Is this really going to make any difference? I doubt it, domain names with a .co.uk suffix will still be a fraction of the price that GoDaddy etc. charge in the USA than our 'not for profit' does in the UK.

Is China going to demand 'democracy' basing voting rights for regulation on the number of users they 'represent'?

To paraphrase an old Chinese curse - we live in interesting times......

My thoughts on this action are many. One is a question. Did the U.S. have an agreed 2015 date to relinquish it's control? If not, why now? Human rights violations don't just exist overseas. I could name hundreds of examples where free speech is threatened in the U.S. One would be facebook deleting the photos that a mother posted on her page of her infant daughter that was born with a severe brain defect and only lived 8 hours. They held her, bathed her and loved her for those 8 hours and took video and photos of her that were a true reflection of this tiny life. Facebook deemed those photos inappropriate and took them down. She re-posted them and they shut her page down for 24 hours. I have seen things on facebook that I have found offensive but it is facebook that is making those decisions. What I find offensive they don't. Facebook has full power in its arena. That is pretty scary as is the thought of "international stakeholders" running the domain authority. We value free speech in the U.S. as it is part of our constitution. Many countries do not. If facebooks behavior is a relection of what is going to be our future, God hlep us!

I would much prefer control of the internet remains in the US. And if not possible - then a combination of free democratic countries in Europe and US. I just don't think this should be left to the UN.
Viggo Madsen

Hmmm... I shudder at the thought of the US losing or relinquishing control of the internet and whilst I accept that US democracy may not be perfect it's the closest we have to being so. Que sera sera

The internet was paid for by the U.S. taxpayer and they are the owners of it. Our government is run by large corporations, wall street, and the elite who want a one world government. Moving the internet to this U.N. control is part of this movement. It has nothing to do with the NSA as proposed. This is a cover for moving it to the one world government movement. With the control moved away from the U.S. it removes the power from the rightful owners, the American people, so once it is moved what can any American do when the power over their internet sites, websites, etc are controlled elsewhere. It's just part of the central power play.

Our money is centrally controlled in world banks ran by the elite, our congress and president is controlled by the elite corporations and banks and the power shift is continuing to be moved openly into the hands of those who had been controlling these same things in secret for decades. The internet is just one cog in the desired power structure. It goes much deeper than the centralization of the internet and money, it is about reducing the American people to servants of the elite with no property rights and little freedom as we have know it. These elitist do not like democratic societies who can vote them out of power. Take away the power of the people by reducing the power of congress which is handed to the executive branch which is handed to the U.N.

And the story continues, it's not about the control of the internet, it is about the control of you and me. Are you still asleep?

Finally, an understandable explanation of what is happening. Good work.

Ok, but why does the US want to give it up in the first place and let other third world countries have it??

How could this happen to something Al Gore invented?

I hereby nominate Bob Rankin as the next internet "God"!
Respects!

John,
It is because our government no longer represents you and me, the government represents those who pay them (banks, corporations, industrial military complex. These same "globalist" are not patriotic to America but to their pocket book and their power. It really goes much deeper than space is allowed here. Many in our congress for the most part and many of our past presidents are one world recruits. The people of our country really don't have a clue of what is transpiring. "Our" Federal Reserve is not ours, the owners are people from around the world. They print our money and disburse it to their other central banks around the world for their personal use as they see fit and the American people as you have witnessed are responsible for their corrupt losses from these derivatives, etc. Moving our production overseas was by design to indebt this country to the breaking point, we are here. The power of the American people had to be debased in order for us to ry uncle and cave to their "better"life in the new currency, new government era. I believe they will get a little further along but it is already crumbling down. They will not succeed but in the attempt to make this one world government, much hardship for all the people of the world will have to be endured. These people think they do God a service, however they are power hungry criminals which will not stop until they are stopped. Like I said space does not allow an in-depth explanation but in a nutshell our government is being circumvented by the Wall Street banks, and the large corporations (one and the same) and their employees, the CIA, NSA, Homeland Security, FBI. It may sound lie a joke but these depraved minds have bought and paid for the top ranks of all these institutions. The lower echelon, rank and file, honest employees of these same institutions are most times as frustrated as the rest of us are. All you need to do is control the head and you control the body so they think. There are two America's, one are the people who elect our congress and the other is the elite who own the congress after they get there. ETc, etc, etc,

While certainly there's pressure on the USA and on its officials from the folks with the fat wallets, there's also a pernicious idea that since power corrupts, exercising power is a sin and the best thing to do is just toss the power away-- preferably to some body that seems to be run responsibly. But in general, all those international organizations, from the UN down, are run more irresponsibly than the US Congress.

Thank you, Bob ... For explaining this issue, in common language. I understand it better, now.

While, I tend to disagree with most of what Sonny Barnes has written ... I do agree, that the UN would be the worse place to "hand over the reigns" of the Internet to!!! Please, take for instance the Human Rights Committee of the UN ... Most of the countries involved and that are on this committee ... Commit human rights crimes, daily!!! The minute the UN was formed, it was as lackluster as the League of Nations was, that was totally disbanded ... The UN should be disbanded, as well.

I also, do not think that Europe, especially Russia, should not have "control" of the Internet, either!!! Heavens, they can't even control their own countries well enough, yet alone, the Internet. Forget, any of the Asian countries, as well, like China or Malaysia or Singapore or The Phillipines.

Sonny Barnes is right, about past Presidents working towards a One World Government. Mind you, this has been both Democratic and Republican Presidents, so this really is big and so, this has been on the "books" for some time, now. This "movement' has more to do with the Banking Institutions, than really Corporations, though they have a "hand" in this concept, as well. I worry, about that whole concept, myself, like Sonny does.

Does what Sonny and I are saying, sound conspiratorial??? In many respects it is ... But, the bottom line is, since the 1980's ... There has been subtle changes, within the world's financial handlings and in all honesty, the World Bank has gained, quite a bit of power, during this time frame. Just saying.

I agree with most of what is being said here. Even our President, a definite "one-world er", is for this. He has been on a mission to socialize and weaken this country. Done a lot of damage already. While Facebook is a useful social networking tool, it is just another distraction. Most people are more interested in it, American Idol, etc. than what is happening in the world. Russia is about to invade Ukraine, there is a possibility that the Malaysian airliner was hijacked and possibly crashed to serve Allah, and our Congress allows more and more unconstitutional acts by our President to go unchallenged, giving him more reason to believe he is "King". But I bet most people know what J Lo wore on AI Wednesday night. Sad.

I agree that there are people and organizations who "run" things in this world, however, it is somewhat unfair to indicate that all groups in power should be lumped into that bag. There are leaders in our government who are honest and actually have a desire to serve those who elected them, though with our current structure it is difficult to stay that way. There are corporations who have people in power who have taken huge risks to further the development of ingenious technology and have provided for economic stability for many individuals and families. Not everyone in government/security organizations is an Edward Snowden nor a Lois Lerner. I am not commenting here on the positions these people have taken but the chaos their choices have brought. I am unsure if either of those individuals are smart enough to know how they have furthered the cause of the progressives elitists they work for or did work for. Those elitists control by fear and by the use of smoke and mirrors. They divert our attention by creating crisis situations while they accomplish their evil deeds. The disseminate non-factual information repeatedly until it becomes "truth" because people have heard it for so long and are too lazy to search out the facts. They turn certain people and groups into "monsters" while they destroy our inalienable rights. This is the nature of absolute power. Control the masses through fear of what will happen if we don't do this or that thing.

One small example would be carbon dioxide. It is actually the very gas of life on this planet. It has become an evil monster whose footprint must be done away with. If you produce it you must necessarily be punished. Yet this planet cannot exist without it and the upswing of carbon in dioxide in our atmosphere is what allows us produce better and more wholesome crops. Carbon dioxide actually reduces the harmful effects of pollutants like ozone and nitrous oxide in the air, or too much nitrogen fertilizer in the soil. More carbon dioxide in the air has enabled plants to survive conditions of prolonged heat, drought and flooding that would otherwise kill them. This has sustained the food supply for our growing populations. Yes, there are areas where famines exist and people are starving but that has far more to do with how their governments control their people than with carbon dioxide being the culprit. Strangely, this information is not what people hear. In order to control the masses and create wealth and power for a few, the population is being filled with misinformation to create an atmosphere of fear and urgency and now those lies have become truth.

This is just a small example of how freedom of speech and information exchange could be threatened by the internet going to the control of unknown individuals. Not everyone might agree with the example I have given, but the facts of carbon dioxide do speak for themselves if you research them with an open mind. What if we lose the ability to find and disseminate information that is available for those who seek it?

Why should you Americans control the Internet, particularly when we (the Brits, via Tim Berners-Lee) invented it. (I assume the Al Gore comment was ironic!).

EDITOR'S NOTE: You're confusing the Internet, which was invented in 1969 as project of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and the WWW software, which Berners-Lee contributed 20 years later.

A lot of our large corporations which grew up around our Wall Street banks also control the Federal Reserve via the hidden stock holders and by proxy. Many Wall Street bank owners and many of your largest corporations in the world are one and the same people. Notice how the powers which surround the President are either large corporate people and Wall Street bankers? They go from bank and corporate leaders back to private business again. Our industrial military complex (large corporations) and our large banks plan wars together for profit. Have you noticed how the U.S. abandons a lot of military equipment after a war? Regardless of the rhetoric equipment that cost tens of millions cost less to ship back than leaving it to others. If you ship it back, you can't build this item and bill the taxpayer. When Baghdad was bombed by over 2600 sorties a day for weeks and practically destroyed the city, who profited? If you look deep into the owners of Bechtel and Haliburton for example you will find the people who billed the American taxpayers for the destruction by the military also greatly profited by the rebuilding of Baghdad. It sounds quiet bazaar to think and say such thinks but it is true, you have a class of people who think of other human beings are just fodder for profit. Yes it is that evil and no, it is not a conspirator theory. It is the way big business works. Just like the meaning of "inflation", our governments and banks have to first debase (steal) our money for it to inflate. While you can't lump all banks and corporations together you can tie the ones together by common ownership and interest. In a nutshell, the America people with their powers and freedoms granted to them by our Republican form of government and the powers granted to them by our constitution pose the greatest threat to these "globalist." The more individual freedoms you give a people the more of a threat they are to those few in world power. Whether it is moving the internet away from these people (Americans), or taking any other power they may yield that will circumvent this OWG power play, it must be done at all cost to succeed. Moving production ( labor and production is true money) overseas moves the power away from those who oppose this power shift. All these different circumstances were all planned to weaken America so the power could be shifted to the people who want it so. Asking the American people for permission to move the power from them was not going to work so you appoint and elect leaders in practically every department that favor this power shift and you do it by stealth. I do not see it succeeding completely as they have planned but it is going to be interesting in the next few years to watch it play out and see how far these elitist get.
Many globalist in their CFR speeches have made it no secret it is the democratic Americans which pose the greatest obstacle to this one world power structure. My comments are not written to prove or disprove anything, they are merely observations which tie it all together. Bob's forum here may not be the place for what it would take a book to explain but this may help in why some may want the internet moved. The American people quickly raise up and put a stop to a lot of these kind of moves while moving it would prevent them from doing so in the future. Interesting drama unfolding…….

I have no problem as long as the group in charge is a non profit organization with no political ties. In fact it is in the best interest of humanity to be politically censor free. For the internet to remain truly free it must be run and maintained by a non profit organization that represents the people of the world and have no ties to any political agenda and a singular goal of keeping internet equally free to all. Governments will always block sites they don't want their citizens to use but those sites still have to be there to block as no site should ever be censored!