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I think eventually we will reach a point where laws like the Online Safety Act become so prevalent that it is basically impossible to comply with all of them si

I think eventually we will reach a point where laws like the Online Safety Act become so prevalent that it is basically impossible to comply with all of them simultaneously and still have a unified internet across the globe. I wouldn’t be surprised if in 10 years or so every country has its own version of the internet only intended for their own people.

firesteelrain 1y ago
We do still have limited entry and exit points to other Countries internets. You could end up with Great Firewalls across the globe if it got bad enough. It doesn’t deter VPNs though
- greenavocado 1y ago
  They will put you behind bars for years for using VPNs once they win.
  - sidewndr46 1y ago
    Who is 'they' here?
    - sejje 1y ago
      The authoritarians locking down the internet, not sure why you need to ask
      - hellojesus 1y ago
        They can try. > And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.
        greenavocado 1y ago
        Would have. Should have. Could have. The reality is the authoritarians won for decades.
        hellojesus 1y ago
        Yee, but we haven't yet given this fight up. And I plan to never.
- foxglacier 1y ago
  The actual great firewall deters VPNs. Western internet blocking tends to be weaker for some reason (cheaper?) but there's no reason they can't be just as effective if the political will was there.
astura 1y ago
I think this was 100% the intention.
chii 1y ago
> still have a unified internet across the globe. which might be the end goal - the internet, with freedom of communication, is a way that the plebs can organize and resist authoritarianism. And as countries are growing increasingly authoritarian (and i include UK here), they may be planning on preventing the old free internet that has enabled so much. So as technologists here at HN, there needs to be a pre-emptive strike to prevent such an outcome from becoming successful. I would have said TOR, but for most people it's a non-starter. What other options are there?
- Epskampie 1y ago
  Well, it's also what has enabled foreign nations to spread misinformation, what enabled people to disappear into their own bubbles filled with falsehoods, etc. Since these things are now tearing at the fabric of democracy, I wouldn't say it's a clean win for the internet so far.
- Kazik24 1y ago
  Applications based on QUIC and/or P2P might be an option. QUIC is designed to not be as easy to filter as TCP + TLS. But then right now it can be blocked by just blocking UDP. But if majority of the internet would use QUIC then blocking UDP would mean blocking most of the internet so the governments wouldn't be so eager do nationwide firewalls (hopefully).
  - ACCount37 1y ago
    Encrypted Client Hello is also a puzzle piece towards that - makes it much harder to kill TLS connections that are trying to reach specific websites. Also makes it easier to conceal proxies. The adoption speed is critical, exactly because of what you're saying. It's easy for a wannabe authoritarian to make a decision to "just block all of ECH and QUIC traffic" if that breaks 0.8% of all traffic - but not if that breaks 80% of all traffic.
  - YetAnotherNick 1y ago
    QUIC or any other technology still needs domain name and both the domain name ownership and DNS could be blocked by governments. Also IP could be blocked.
arealaccount 1y ago
Im sure you will be able to get a passport for digital travel
- nomel 1y ago
  Funneled through your local government router, where you first have to install certificates and agree to let them MitM.
perryizgr8 1y ago
> impossible to comply with all of them simultaneously and still have a unified internet We'll have 2 kinds of apps and websites. One will be super nice products that only work in your country and you can't use it to communicate with outside people. The other kind will work worldwide but because they would be spending so much more on compliance their product would be a bare minimum ad riddled crap.

firesteelrain 1y ago

We do still have limited entry and exit points to other Countries internets. You could end up with Great Firewalls across the globe if it got bad enough. It doesn’t deter VPNs though

greenavocado 1y ago
They will put you behind bars for years for using VPNs once they win.
- sidewndr46 1y ago
  Who is 'they' here?
  - sejje 1y ago
    The authoritarians locking down the internet, not sure why you need to ask
    - hellojesus 1y ago
      They can try. > And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more – we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.
      - greenavocado 1y ago
        Would have. Should have. Could have. The reality is the authoritarians won for decades.
        hellojesus 1y ago
        Yee, but we haven't yet given this fight up. And I plan to never.
foxglacier 1y ago
The actual great firewall deters VPNs. Western internet blocking tends to be weaker for some reason (cheaper?) but there's no reason they can't be just as effective if the political will was there.

astura 1y ago

I think this was 100% the intention.

chii 1y ago

> still have a unified internet across the globe. which might be the end goal - the internet, with freedom of communication, is a way that the plebs can organize and resist authoritarianism. And as countries are growing increasingly authoritarian (and i include UK here), they may be planning on preventing the old free internet that has enabled so much. So as technologists here at HN, there needs to be a pre-emptive strike to prevent such an outcome from becoming successful. I would have said TOR, but for most people it's a non-starter. What other options are there?

Epskampie 1y ago
Well, it's also what has enabled foreign nations to spread misinformation, what enabled people to disappear into their own bubbles filled with falsehoods, etc. Since these things are now tearing at the fabric of democracy, I wouldn't say it's a clean win for the internet so far.
Kazik24 1y ago
Applications based on QUIC and/or P2P might be an option. QUIC is designed to not be as easy to filter as TCP + TLS. But then right now it can be blocked by just blocking UDP. But if majority of the internet would use QUIC then blocking UDP would mean blocking most of the internet so the governments wouldn't be so eager do nationwide firewalls (hopefully).
- ACCount37 1y ago
  Encrypted Client Hello is also a puzzle piece towards that - makes it much harder to kill TLS connections that are trying to reach specific websites. Also makes it easier to conceal proxies. The adoption speed is critical, exactly because of what you're saying. It's easy for a wannabe authoritarian to make a decision to "just block all of ECH and QUIC traffic" if that breaks 0.8% of all traffic - but not if that breaks 80% of all traffic.
- YetAnotherNick 1y ago
  QUIC or any other technology still needs domain name and both the domain name ownership and DNS could be blocked by governments. Also IP could be blocked.

arealaccount 1y ago

Im sure you will be able to get a passport for digital travel

nomel 1y ago
Funneled through your local government router, where you first have to install certificates and agree to let them MitM.

perryizgr8 1y ago

> impossible to comply with all of them simultaneously and still have a unified internet We'll have 2 kinds of apps and websites. One will be super nice products that only work in your country and you can't use it to communicate with outside people. The other kind will work worldwide but because they would be spending so much more on compliance their product would be a bare minimum ad riddled crap.