decisions they make on when to retain, filter, monitor, and share the information they
control (and with whom) are increasingly having important political ramifications for
citizens the world over. The normative terrain outlined in Access Controlled thus offers a
compelling example of the privatization of authority.
Perhaps the most important unintended consequences may come from new conflicts
and offensive operations documented in this volume. The growing acceptance of
the militarization of cyberspace, by states and by third-party actors, risks significant
blowbacks as these techniques—once hidden from view or confined to marginalized
contexts—become an entrenched characteristic of global relations. Societies around
the world—none more so than those of the OSCE—are heavily dependent on globally
networked technologies. They have been locked in and interpenetrated by a digital
web of their own spinning. 11 And so from a rational perspective, an arms race in cyberspace is to no one’s advantage; a collapse of one information infrastructure would
undoubtedly affect others—perhaps even the perpetrator. But as so often is the case in
the competitive dynamics of world politics, the logic of security dilemmas can easily
overwhelm and entrap rational decision-making processes. Today, governments are
responding to the threats of cyberwar not by pursuing norms of mutual restraint
but by endorsing new techniques of offensive operations, including outsourcing to
third-party actors and criminal organizations.
Last, this newly emerging normative terrain of next-generation Internet controls
presents major challenges to monitoring organizations, including the ONI itself. The
technical investigations that informed our country studies and that are reported on
here represent a methodology borne out of the need to monitor first-generation technical filtering techniques. If the trends identified in Access Controlled are accurate, then
these first-generation filtering techniques may be gradually superseded by a variety of
next-generation controls that are more subtle and fluid and deeply integrated into
social relations rather than fixed at specific choke points. This possibility suggests that
the ONI itself must now respond with a new suite of methodologies if it hopes to remain relevant to the challenges of cyberspace governance that lay ahead.
Notes
1. John Palfrey and Urs Gasser, Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives
(New York: Basic Books, 2008).
2. Unpredictable consequences of technological change is a theme explored in Ronald J. Deibert,
Parchment, Printing and Hypermedia: Modes of Communication in World Order Transformation (New
York: Columbia University Press, 1997).
3. Tom Standage, The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth
Century’s On-line Producers (New York: Berkeley Books, 1998).
12
Ronald Deibert and Rafal Rohozinski
control (and with whom) are increasingly having important political ramifications for
citizens the world over. The normative terrain outlined in Access Controlled thus offers a
compelling example of the privatization of authority.
Perhaps the most important unintended consequences may come from new conflicts
and offensive operations documented in this volume. The growing acceptance of
the militarization of cyberspace, by states and by third-party actors, risks significant
blowbacks as these techniques—once hidden from view or confined to marginalized
contexts—become an entrenched characteristic of global relations. Societies around
the world—none more so than those of the OSCE—are heavily dependent on globally
networked technologies. They have been locked in and interpenetrated by a digital
web of their own spinning. 11 And so from a rational perspective, an arms race in cyberspace is to no one’s advantage; a collapse of one information infrastructure would
undoubtedly affect others—perhaps even the perpetrator. But as so often is the case in
the competitive dynamics of world politics, the logic of security dilemmas can easily
overwhelm and entrap rational decision-making processes. Today, governments are
responding to the threats of cyberwar not by pursuing norms of mutual restraint
but by endorsing new techniques of offensive operations, including outsourcing to
third-party actors and criminal organizations.
Last, this newly emerging normative terrain of next-generation Internet controls
presents major challenges to monitoring organizations, including the ONI itself. The
technical investigations that informed our country studies and that are reported on
here represent a methodology borne out of the need to monitor first-generation technical filtering techniques. If the trends identified in Access Controlled are accurate, then
these first-generation filtering techniques may be gradually superseded by a variety of
next-generation controls that are more subtle and fluid and deeply integrated into
social relations rather than fixed at specific choke points. This possibility suggests that
the ONI itself must now respond with a new suite of methodologies if it hopes to remain relevant to the challenges of cyberspace governance that lay ahead.
Notes
1. John Palfrey and Urs Gasser, Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives
(New York: Basic Books, 2008).
2. Unpredictable consequences of technological change is a theme explored in Ronald J. Deibert,
Parchment, Printing and Hypermedia: Modes of Communication in World Order Transformation (New
York: Columbia University Press, 1997).
3. Tom Standage, The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth
Century’s On-line Producers (New York: Berkeley Books, 1998).
12
Ronald Deibert and Rafal Rohozinski