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The Internet Privacy United States Your Rights Online

How the U.S. Became Switchboard to the World 256

Posted by CowboyNeal from the big-brother-is-listening dept.
slugo sent in this Wired story which opens, "A lucky coincidence of economics is responsible for routing much of the world's internet and telephone traffic through switching points in the United States, where, under legislation introduced this week, the U.S. National Security Agency will be free to continue tapping it. ...International phone and internet traffic flows through the United States largely because of pricing models established more than 100 years ago... The United States, where the internet was invented, was also home to the first internet backbone. Combine that architectural advantage with the pricing disparity inherited from the phone networks, and the United States quickly became the center of cyberspace as the internet gained international penetration in the 1990s."
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How the U.S. Became Switchboard to the World More

How the U.S. Became Switchboard to the World

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  • Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @04:15AM (#20950737)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:Does UKUSA expand it? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Noryungi ( 70322 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @04:40AM (#20950837) Homepage Journal
      RTFA: it explains that London is quickly becoming a major hub for European communications. The map is especially revealing in that respect.

      The NZ and AUS participartion in UKUSA is quite interesting, since these countries can be used to tap satellite communications. Quite a lot of fiber goes in and out of Australia as well.

      Communication interception requires more than access to fiber, and these two countries also provide some much needed real-estate.

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by wakim1618 ( 579135 )
        A friend of mine is teaches at a major university in the UK and is in charge of graduate studies in her program this year. After receiving a package for a graduate student who seemed very bright and enthusiastic at the interview, she later received an email that the student will not be coming for reasons the student could not state. Meanwhile there was a large mysterious package for the student that was sent by the same person who had previously sent packages to the department. My friend opened the package
        • I think thats what the 2nd amendment is for......or at least, its your last hope at the moment.
          • I hear the second amendment brought up in every single thread of this kind. Nuts! What are you going to do, start shooting at US government officials? When ae you going to start?

            • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

              by erroneus ( 253617 )
              Believe it or not, the second amendment was intended precisely for that purpose. It's not a question of *if* a government will get out of control, it's *WHEN* a government will get out of control. Owning firearms is one of the last points of defense for a democratic government.

              The sad reality is, however, that the second amendment had been beaten to death and there is just about every imaginable exception written into law... some legal, some not, much unchallenged. The government is already out of contro

              • and now the only people who have the guns are criminals and the government for the most part.
                I have several friends that own guns, and they aren't criminals or part of the government. The government, however, owns tanks, planes, and a few nukes, which none of my friends own. The Second Amendment was written at a time when the government had more guns than the general public, but the guns were still pretty much the same on both sides. That is far from today's situation.

              • now the only people who have the guns are criminals and the government for the most part

                Where did you pull that factoid from? It may be that most criminals own a gun, but unless you are going to call 30% of Americans criminals [justfacts.com], then you are way off base.

                Believe it or not, the second amendment was intended precisely for that purpose. It's not a question of *if* a government will get out of control, it's *WHEN* a government will get out of control. Owning firearms is one of the last points of defense for a

                • It may be that most criminals own a gun,
                  Actually, on second thoughts that probably isn't true. I suspect most criminals in the USA are relatively harmless dope smokers, less likely to own a gun than average.

                • Republicans are corrupt and morally bankrupt, the Democrats are no real alternative, and the political system is fixed to disallow any other alternative.

                  The American government - just one party away from Communism

              • Believe it or not, the second amendment was intended precisely for that purpose. It's not a question of *if* a government will get out of control, it's *WHEN* a government will get out of control. Owning firearms is one of the last points of defense for a democratic government.

                I really don't understand that logic. What are you going to do - start murdering your elected polititians because you don't like their policies? Then what - you and a bunch of vigilante neighbours try and take over the government?

                • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

                  by wgaryhas ( 872268 )
                  What about the American Revolution? That was kinda violent.

                  • What about the American Revolution? That was kinda violent.

                    That was a fight for independance of an already established government from another government. It was not a bunch of yokels in a pickup truck with shotguns rallying against their own government.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by SkyDude ( 919251 )

          She left a message with the student and was contacted by... some arm of the US government in charge of protecting US campuses.

          Could you please reveal what arm of the US Government protects college campuses?

          The only government protection I know of is the US military, and I'm fairly certain they're not stationed on US campuses.

      • The article is trying to highlight a long understood concern and uses a few valid point, but the supporting map doesn't look anything like reality. The map is clearly nothing more than a graphic showing voice traffic through the U.S. and England, and excludes all other international traffic. The situation is no where near as dire as the article tries to make it sound, take anything published in Wired with the same degree of confidence as a trashy tabloid.

        Traffic in Europe bound for the U.S. and Asia-Pacific

    • Tap away... (Score:3, Funny)

      by nigham ( 792777 )
      It somehow amuses me to think that the United States is spending resources in trying to figure out what I'm saying when I make an international call that has nothing to do with the US. The tapping software itself, AI to detect catch phrases, language experts to worry about translation, AND worrying about the legal issues involved in all of this. All this because my mother wants to know if I'm having dinner properly or not. By all means, tap away.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Dunbal ( 464142 )
        And all the while the US dollar keeps sinking lower and lower. Soon they won't be able to afford all those computer parts made in Taiwan.
      • Pricing of products, plans for entering markets in the US etc? You're not concerned that information might make it into the hands of your competitors?
         
    • There probably isn't much running through Australia either. They have an extreamly poor connection to the outside world when compared to places like the US or the UK.

      There was actually a map of undersea cables a few years ago that I managed to dig up.
      http://www.news.com/2300-1033_3-6035611-1.html [news.com]
    • Well that is mostly incorrect. He may have written a book, and I'm sure it is mostly correct (because there are too many people out there that can disprove any fallacy he writes). Most likely you've summarized it incorrectly.

      United States Signal Intelligence Directive 9 prohibits the wire-tapping or voice intercept of the citizens of a country that is hosting US intelligence agencies and USSID 18 prohibits the wire-tapping of US Citizens anywhere in the world or by any entity that is an interest to the

      • While we depend on the help of other countries, we apply the same rules banning the collection of intelligence on US citizens regardless if we are operating in the UK, or if the UK is acting on our behalf from Germany.

        Really? What about the recent demand that Canadian airlines hand over all passenger data to the US, even if that flight is not stopping in the US? http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2007/10/11/uscanada-flights.html [www.cbc.ca] Last I checked the US and Canada were allies, although that might change if th

        • Handing over flight manifests has nothing to do with wire-tapping and signals intercept, which is what this article is about.

  • Lucky! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by pipatron ( 966506 ) <pipatron@gmail.com> on Friday October 12, 2007 @04:18AM (#20950755) Homepage
    As a Swedish citizen, I feel so lucky that all my communications will be monitored by a government I can not influence through voting!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Nossie ( 753694 )
      thats ok, in 20 years time routing internet traffic through America will be like moving spice through the Khyber pass. We'll just route around your broken ass antiquated technology.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by bjourne ( 1034822 )
      As a Swedish citizen, you should stop being so stuck up and realize that your government too [thelocal.se] wants to snoop your email. Which is, I presume, a government you can influence through voting. Reinfeldt sure loves to kiss Bush's ass. Vote right (left that is) next time.

    • Re:Lucky! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by martin ( 1336 ) <maxsec@@@gmail...com> on Friday October 12, 2007 @04:37AM (#20950825) Journal
      cough - same as a US citizen then ;-)

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by PinkyDead ( 862370 )
      Wreck their heads and their servers:

      1) Set your signature to "Al Qaeda Terrorist Bomb Pakistan"
      2) Attach bad porn 8192-bit encrypted to all your e-mails
    • As a terrorist, I feel so lucky that all my communications are encrypted and that I have nothing to fear from passive monitoring.

    • As a Swedish citizen, I feel so lucky that all my communications will be monitored by a government I can not influence through voting!

      Is that the government of the USA you're talking about, or that of your own country? I know a lot of countries where one's vote (when trying not to go the sheeple route) does not count for enough to make a difference to the outcome.

    • As a Swedish citizen, I feel so lucky that all my communications will be monitored by a government I can not influence through voting!

      That's a simple fact of life whenever you make an international call. No exceptions. The other end of your call inherently falls under their laws, which you have no influence over.

      The only difference here is that all the anger is getting directed at the US, since it's the 800 lbs gorilla everyone loves to hate.

  • Is it time to build a new internet now? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Nursie ( 632944 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @04:25AM (#20950775)
    I, for one, do not welcome the casnning of my email by the USA, a country of which I am not a part and have no influence over. A country which is proving itself ever les freedom loving and ever more dubious over human rights and the rule of law (as it applies to governments, police, courts and the military).

    Meh, guess I'll keep using ssh wherever possible.

    • Oh come on! (Score:3, Insightful)

      by maillemaker ( 924053 )
      I know it's fun to hop on the "let's hate the USA" parade, but come on.

      Does anyone /really/ think that every other country in the world doesn't monitor the communications systems that route through /their/ country?

    • I, for one, do not welcome the casnning of my email by the USA

      Oh? So which country did you want to have spying on all you traffic instead? Just name them.

      It's utterly unrealistic to believe there is any country that isn't spying on every bit of international traffic they can get their hands on. At least the US is largely open and honest about the spying (it wasn't a Chinese newspaper you heard about this from...) while other countries either lack the opportunity to spy on anyone, or are just better at ke

  • steganography to the rescue (Score:4, Insightful)

    by wwmedia ( 950346 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @04:58AM (#20950937)
    i wonder how much data can be encrypted using Steganography [wikipedia.org] in that infamous Goatse [wikipedia.org] image

    CIA can look at a gapping hole all day then for all i care!

  • Doubtful data (Score:5, Interesting)

    by johnw ( 3725 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @04:59AM (#20950947)
    I'd be very doubtful of the information shown by that graph. It seems to suggest that there's more telephone traffic between London and Western Australia, and between the USA and eastern Australia than there is between the two bits of Australia. Even if you accept that unlikely fact, why is that people in Western Australia phone London and people in eastern Australia don't?

    I suspect that the graph has been prepared from data which simply shows where calls passing through the USA and London have originated. Calls which don't pass through a few nominated hubs simply haven't been included, which is obviously going to lead to the distorted results shown.

    • I suspect that it's showing international data only, data transfers within a country aren't being shown. Notice that the same is true for the east and west coast of the States.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by johnw ( 3725 )
        In which case all it's showing is that the map has been drawn with the USA in the middle. You could equally well draw it with Europe in the middle and it would appear to show the same result about Europe.

        The only valid conclusion you can draw from the map is that there's a lot of bandwidth across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. This is not a surprise.
    • The caption says it is only international calls.

      Eivind.

    • I'd be very doubtful of the information shown by that graph.

      I wouldn't. It seems perfectly reasonable.

      It seems to suggest that there's more telephone traffic between London and Western Australia, and between the USA and eastern Australia than there is between the two bits of Australia.

      Eastern Australia calling Western Australia isn't "international phone-call traffic" by any stretch of the imagination, so it doesn't qualify for inclusion on that map.

      why is that people in Western Australia phone London and

  • Please apply common sense (Score:5, Insightful)

    by thesandbender ( 911391 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @05:16AM (#20951005)
    Laying fiber across a countryside, much less an ocean requires corporate dollars. Even Gates, Ellison, etc. would notice a substantial hit to their pocket book if they funded a trans-oceanic cable. And, that cable has to be maintained. That cost money.

    The point is, your internet communications are always going to in control of someone with a lot more money and susceptible and even beholden to political influence. Get used to it.

    Encrypt your data if necessary (99.5% of it is no where near that important) and you're done.

    What kills me is that a quarter to a half of the people who are up in arms about this publish their daily lives and personal details on blogs which Google, MSN and Yahoo immediately suck up. Yet it if the NSA wants to know whats going on... they go ape-sh*t. Here's a clue people... I don't talk about my private life on the intertubes... never have... never will.
    • "Subject does not talk about his private life on the intertubes... never has... never will."

    • What kills me is that a quarter to a half of the people who are up in arms about this publish their daily lives and personal details on blogs

      People are only too happy to tell you about the things they want you to know. I sincerely doubt people are so stupid that they are posting on the internet the private things they only want one or two close friends/family to know...

      Here's a clue people... I don't talk about my private life on the intertubes... never have... never will.

      But you do on the telephone, Googl

    • I am no blogger (though I am posting here through only a thin facade of anonymity). However I do feel there is a very large difference between revealing information about yourself that you choose to reveal and having information about yourself unwillingly disseminated to unknown parties.

      Just because you talk freely about some parts of your life, does that mean the whole of it should be fair game?

  • Switchboard for whom? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by bjoeg ( 629707 )
    As european most of my european, russian and asian traffic rarely goes over US lines, maybe through US companies but still routers placed in Europe.

    But Mr. NSA, if you really wanna listen in, could you please remove the spam for me?

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by arivanov ( 12034 )
      Most of "your" traffic does not. All of your data does.

      Due to the very low capacity available on the direct Eu to India route around the Arabian peninsula most traffic between EU and India traverses USA. Considering how much of your data processing is being outsourced you can guess from there on.

      Which reminds me, frankly, the data EU commissioners should start requiring compliance statements for all transit communication traffic, not just processing entities abroad the way they do now.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tuoqui ( 1091447 )
      I dont know I think the Russian Mafia [slashdot.org] is doing a pretty good job.

      Yes I know its probably fake. Still amusing though.

  • Advanced Technology in the hands of Religion (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Zombie Ryushu ( 803103 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @05:51AM (#20951157)
    This will continue as long as large numbers of religious leaders and religious voters continue to run the country. You have to understand that about half this country believes that we are in a religious war to defeat an unholy enemy and that on both sides of this religiously motivated war will do whatever it takes to win. This applies just as much to the Islamic fanatics of the Wahabi in Saudi Arabia, as it does to the Christian fanatics that are prevalent in the US Military such as Peter Pace, and Congress, like Orrin Hatch.

    Do understand something about Christianity though. Keep in mind, I am a Secular Aignostic. I don't believe in Christian doctrines.

    In the Bible, God didn't come down and be selected by two thirds majority. In the Bible, The ten commandments aren't Ten generally considered good ideas, they are commandments. To this end, A cataclysmic impass has occurred.

    Whether God exists is sorta irrellevent to the discussion sadly.

    All these doctrines call for the ahnialation of all the others. Now how people implement the philosophies may vary, and some interpretations cherry pick and are benign enough to be tolerant. But the doctrines are not Tolerant. Tolerance would be seen as weakness in the tone these doctrines and allow them to be undermined. So the doctrines in their purest form call for the suppression of all freedoms and the extermination of competing ideas. Christian people can be very tolerant. but the actual religion itself is incapable of being tolerant. The same is true of Islam. The doctrines are written in a depressingly genocidal way.

    Well, why is this important to whats going on now? Well. we now have U.S. Style Jeffersonian democracy vs. Christianity. For doctrines like Christianity in our case and Islam in theirs, Jeffersonian Demoracy and Christianity are incompatible. In the U.S. enough Americans chose Jesus over the Constitution. There were enough Americans who felt that following the dictates of their God was so important that they put people in power who believed as they did that religion was simply more important, and were willing to cast the constitution aside. The prevailing sentiment was there was "Too much Freedom, not enough God" Christian doctrine is such that things like Freedom of speech, privacy, etc cannot be tolerated because they undermine the religion. As long as the US loves God/Jesus more than Freedom, no one will have freedom, because in both the Bible and the Quran, no one has any freedom.

    We get the privilige of living in a freer society only when times are peaceful, and the religious doctrines can be safely "ignored for convienence". Because part of being free means you are free Not to follow the religion's wishes. As such, Religions like Christianity and Islam, and liberal free society are fundamentally incompatible. We elected leaders who ascribe to this, so our freedoms, such as our private telephone conversations are going to be monitored to keep an eye on the population of 'good Christians'. It doesn't end there. Thats just the tip of the iceburg

  • The United States, where the internet was invented by Al Gore.

    There. Fixed it.

  • That map is highly misleading (Score:5, Informative)

    by mbone ( 558574 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @07:02AM (#20951525)
    That map is highly misleading, at least for Internet traffic - it shows usage, not topology.

    It used to be, in the beginning, that most Internet traffic went through the US, as links were leased lines mostly to / from the US. Now, it mostly follows the fiber. (Most of the global undersea fiber, BTW, is owned by two Indian companies, Reliance and VSNL.) Most Japan / India traffic, for example, or Japan / Austrialia traffic, will never touch the US. Ditto Middle East / Japan or Middle East / India, or Europe / India or Europe / Middle East. Only for Europe / East Asia or Australia / Europe is there a good chance (not a certainty) that you will be routed through the US.

    Of course, all of this is based on where the fiber goes, and your milage may definitely vary - ISPs don't always do the most sensible thing. As an example, 3 days after 9/11 a major ISP lost their connection between France and Germany, as it turned out that they were routing that traffic through a New York telco hotel, which went down when the generators ran out of diesel fuel. I was told that there was no institutional memory in the ISP that this was being done, and it made no sense from a fiber topology standpoint, but there it was.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by johnw ( 3725 )

      As an example, 3 days after 9/11 a major ISP lost their connection between France and Germany, as it turned out that they were routing that traffic through a New York telco hotel, which went down when the generators ran out of diesel fuel. I was told that there was no institutional memory in the ISP that this was being done, and it made no sense from a fiber topology standpoint, but there it was.

      This things often happen purely as a result of expediency.

      I recall many years ago when I was working in Melbourne we needed some terminals on the 3rd floor of the building (it was a telephone exchange) connected to a computer on the 2nd floor. Alas, there was no spare electric string between the two, but a simple solution to the problem was found - just put a stat mux in each room and route the connections via Tasmania! It worked - don't knock it.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mbone ( 558574 )
        Geoff Huston has talked about the early days of the Internet in Australia, where inter-city traffic was sent through MAE-West in California, again for reasons of expediency. I doubt that there is much of that now...

  • Because of Antimonopoly (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Doc Ruby ( 173196 ) on Friday October 12, 2007 @08:47AM (#20952797) Homepage Journal
    Those original pricing models were set by the government, to compensate for allowing AT&T to operate a monopoly in an essential industry. They were updated to be even more encouraging to attract foreign routing when the AT&T monopoly was broken up. Which breakup was also responsible for the fast, extensive and open growth of the Internet.

    If AT&T had run its monopoly without government intervention to protect people and markets, the domestic infrastructure wouldn't have been so attractive.

    Which makes the current recoup by AT&T of nearly all its monopoly such an obvious threat. And its secret collusion with its only competitor, Verizon, to wiretap us such an obviously perverted government role in assembling a cartel. And making selective prosecution of Qwest, because Qwest refused to collude with the cartel, one of the worst crimes (not involving torture or killing, at least as far as we know) that Bush has committed against us.

    We got those privileges because we kept our telecom monopolies under control, and our government in the service of protecting the people. Now that Bush has reversed that system, egging on monopolies to use them against the people, our entire system is a nightmare.

    Hear that, AT&T?

  • The United States, where the internet was invented
    ...by Al Gore, who was subsequently discovered Global Warming and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Science.

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