[rpd] New Policy Proposal - "Anti-Shutdown (AFPUB-2017-GEN-001-DRAFT-01)"

Fri Apr 14 11:46:50 UTC 2017

My brothers happy Easter,

The Afrinic CEO already discuss about the planning of the open discussion
in the Nairobi at AIS conference.

So my brothers let us discuss all open during this the meeting as our
government officials will be there and our technology people too.

The Afrinic can share more topics too about the challenges as some brothers
here said the shuts cost economic damage.

But you know also they governmemt can ask the private isp to give internet
to the president. They government can even use the satelite like one
project in our village. The satelite gives internet also from people from
America so even if the Afrinic can implement such bad policy, the
government will just laugh at the Afrinic.

I know the government people can even use the 3G internet on their mobile.
They can even ask the isp to give them NAT internet if the Afrinic is
saying no IP address to the president office. The ISP will panic not to
loose the license for ISP and it will make president office have internet.

Like i make some research and in the country of North Korea they have
strict internet and they get from the China. This is power of government
when you want to use force to the government.

Even in the UK  i read the government there has the power to shuts the
internet.

So this topic only open discussion which involve our government can make
aware that some impact if they shut but there ia other solutions if the
governmment is afraid with national security due to the internet.

Best Regards,

Tutu Ngcaba
Kwazulu Techno Hubs
South Africa

On 14 Apr 2017 12:39 p.m., "Andrew Alston" <Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com>
wrote:

Hi Walu,

Speaking as an individual….

It’s an interesting question – though realistically – there have been talks
and proposals about “national internet registries” for years – and the ship
has kind of sailed.

Firstly – with regards to v4 – there are no resources to distribute to
these national internet registries left – and the only way that a national
internet registry could be formed would be for them to get resources to
allocate into such a registry – and the AfriNIC policies currently don’t
allow for it.  Effectively, a policy proposal would have to come forward
that allowed an entity to hold resources and allocate them within the rules
of the allocation policy – I don’t see any such thing occurring.

Secondly – it is very difficult for a government to force an organisation
to give up already allocated space – because again – that would be a
transfer of resources under the current policies – and that can only happen
in the case of mergers and acquisitions at the moment – or in the case of
an internal transfer which has to be agreed by both parties under the
internal transfer policy.

We have to remember, that AfriNIC is an independent organisation and
external governments do not have legal jurisdiction – not without treaties
that would have to be ratified and the location where AfriNIC is domiciled
would have to be a signatory to said treaties.  At which point, it’s
possible to switch jurisdictions.

Yes – I see a lot of noise coming from this – but do I believe that
governments can do more harm in that scenario than they are by shutting
down the Internet?  No – not at all.  There is simply no evidence or
mechanism that exists for this to happen.

And yes – we know there are consequences – but let us also look at the
reverse side of the consequences – to do nothing and have the internet
shutdown – how many people lose their jobs when ISP’s no longer have
revenue coming in to pay those people?  How much damage is done to the user
on the ground when the internet is shut down?  The stats are out that 2.4
billion dollars haemorrhaged out of economies due to shutdowns, what are
the consequences of doing nothing in that regard?

Everything has its pros and cons – I simply argue that standing by and
watch it happening with no concrete action, does far more harm than
attempting to stand for what is right.

*From:* Walubengo J [mailto:jwalu at yahoo.com]
*Sent:* 12 April 2017 18:44
*To:* Andrew Alston <Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com>; Arsène Tungali <
arsenebaguma at gmail.com>; Mukom Akong T. <mukom.tamon at gmail.com>
*Cc:* rpd at afrinic.net
*Subject:* Re: [rpd] New Policy Proposal - "Anti-Shutdown
(AFPUB-2017-GEN-001-DRAFT-01)"

@Andrew,

I have no objection to attempts to reign in 'internet averse' governments.
My worry is what will happen next if and after the policy passes?

Most of us are aware of the ITU/ICANN tensions with respect to internet
governance...will such a policy give impetus or reason for even the
'moderate' governments to finally have a tangible reason to push for and
get their national or regional RIRs?

Perhaps at the moment the effort and impetus to go national/regional RIRs
has not gained traction simply because there has not been any thing
substantive enough to rally the governments together for such a move. Could
such a policy be the missing rallying call?

After all no government would want to be told that they are offline because
some "Company Ltd" based somewhere in the middle of the Indian Ocean has
switched them off (no offence Kris, to the Star and Key of the Indian
Ocean... just wearing the hat of some typical African dictator :-).

In short, lets debate the policy, but remember as we say in contemporary
Kenya - choices do have consequences.

walu.

------------------------------

*From:* Andrew Alston <Andrew.Alston at liquidtelecom.com>
*To:* Arsène Tungali <arsenebaguma at gmail.com>; Mukom Akong T. <
mukom.tamon at gmail.com>
*Cc:* "rpd at afrinic.net" <rpd at afrinic.net>
*Sent:* Wednesday, April 12, 2017 5:52 PM
*Subject:* Re: [rpd] New Policy Proposal - "Anti-Shutdown
(AFPUB-2017-GEN-001-DRAFT-01)"

Hi Arsene,

Your comments are well noted.

Let me ask you however, as a compromise position, would you be willing to
accept a situation where we limit this to the state, parastatals, and with
the exclusion of academia and space that can be proved to belong to
critical services (hospitals, emergency services etc).

I’m not sure how we would word this in – but I’d be quite willing to work
with anyone who wants to try and have a bash at getting this wording out if
you’re interested in looking at it from that perspective.

We also need to consider the role of the regulator – because often – it is
not the regulator who triggers these shutdowns – it is above them that
those orders come down from.  As a matter of fact, I am quite proud to see
that I have seen one regulator so far stand up on this list and SUPPORT
this proposal – it surprised me and I congratulate and thank them for
standing for their convictions, that really made me a very happy man to see.

I’d love to see more comments from regulators in this discussion about this
– there are many on this list – and let’s hope they are prepared to come
and give their views, either for or against, and explain WHY their views
are what they are.  Let us approach this in the spirit of discussion and
the spirit of finding the RIGHT solution.  If that is an edit of the
current policy or a total re-draft – either way is acceptable.

I think the point here is – I believe there needs to be something more than
statements as  you have said – there need to be consequences for actions
such as these – how those consequences are directed and applied is a very
wide debate – and I think it’s one we should all deeply engage in.  That
however an opinion – there are others who feel that the neutrality of the
internet organizations is sacrosanct and we should stay out of it – and on
a personal level and not speaking for anyone else, or any other entity, I
acknowledge those views – I choose however to disagree with that stance.

What I am seeing so far from the discussions, is that there seems to be
general agreement on the fact that there is a problem – so the problem
statement of rogue states and shutdowns is real – the debate then is how we
do something about it – so, open to ideas, and once again, open to
co-authors

Andrew

*From:* Arsène Tungali [mailto:arsenebaguma at gmail.com
<arsenebaguma at gmail.com>]
*Sent:* 12 April 2017 17:14
*To:* Mukom Akong T. <mukom.tamon at gmail.com>
*Cc:* rpd at afrinic.net
*Subject:* Re: [rpd] New Policy Proposal - "Anti-Shutdown
(AFPUB-2017-GEN-001-DRAFT-01)"

Hi everyone,

Internet shutdowns is a topic that I am interested in so much and have been
involved in research, drafting statements sent to government officials,
have spoken in various avenues and have written pieces for websites, blogs,
journals, etc. I consider myself being an advocate of an open and
accessible internet to all. I am opposed to any form of disruption over the
network including Internet shutdown whatever the reason.

For those of us who have little knowledge on this, I would suggest two
links:

-          One which is a report on the State of Internet freedoms in DRC
(my country): http://cipesa.org/?wpfb_dl=234

-          And a blogpost I recently wrote for CIPESA on the same issue:
http://cipesa.org/2017/03/the-evolution-of-internet-shutdowns-in-dr-congo/

I am also a believer that we need concrete actions (more than just
statements) to help our governments understand that for no reason, they
should shutdown the Internet. In DRC, we are at 4% Internet penetration,
yet we have experienced Internet shutdown more than 4 times, being one of
those African countries that have been seriously touched (Cameroon is now
leading). And we felt the effect of being disconnected to all
communications including SMS, Internet, etc. It is harmful!

I was one of those who sent praises to AFRINIC for issuing a statement
condemning Internet shutdowns and I am glad as a community, we have been
thinking on some practical measures that will, hopefully, force our
government to no longer consider Internet shutdown whenever they are trying
to hide something. I would like to congratulate the authors of this
proposal but I am not yet in support of the measures they have suggested
because, to sum up my point here, *this will cause so much damage to those
entities that will not benefit from resources though they are not
associated with the decision (which is a Gov decision most of the times) to
shutdown the Internet*.

I note so many other people including Seun have mentioned this in this
thread.

After reading the proposal, I have the following comment which are leading
my worry in supporting this proposal as it is:

*We need measures that will only affect the entity ordering the shutdown
(the Government then the Regulator). In my country for example, it is the
Regulator who is executing an order that came from the Gov. If we decide to
not deliver resources to other entities (Schools, research centers, etc),
be they related to the Gov, we will be doing more bad to them as they will
simply be victims.*

I am glad the authors are all from ISPs (if I am not mistaken), which is a
good sign. In this debate across Africa, there were close to no statement
or action from ISPs with regards to Internet shutdown though they are the
ones executing, in most cases, the decision to turn it off, a request they
receive from the Regulator. In most cases, they have no means to say no
given the fact that they have signed an agreement (MoU) with the Gov to
abide by any request from the Gov including network disruptions (this is
applicable in DRC as per the report I previously shared).

I do believe there is more ISPs can help with in the battle against
Government ordered shutdowns and if something like this can be added to
this policy, that will be helpful. One of the possibilities are to engage
the Gov. in a win-win discussion. You guys are doing business with the Gov.
and you lose money whenever there is shutdown. There is a way you can find
an agreement with the Gov. and discuss the fact that you cannot continue
losing money when there is no appealing reason to shutdown the Internet. We
have ISPs as AFRINIC members, this is something they can think of and come
up with a proposal (with the support of the community).

If ever this proposal goes further, I would suggest these measures to ONLY
affect the Regulator (not sure if they are also members of AFRINIC but they
might) rather than any entity owned or related to/by the Government. We
will be doing more harm than good.

Thanks,

Arsene

------------------------
**Arsène Tungali**

Co-Founder & Executive Director, *Rudi international
<http://www.rudiinternational.org/>*,
CEO,* Smart Services Sarl <http://www.smart-serv.info/>*, *Mabingwa Forum
<http://www.mabingwa-forum.com/>*
Tel: +243 993810967 <+243%20993%20810%20967>

GPG: 523644A0

*Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo*

2015 Mandela Washington Felllow
<http://tungali.blogspot.com/2015/06/selected-for-2015-mandela-washington.html>
(YALI) - ISOC Ambassador (IGF Brazil
<http://www.internetsociety.org/what-we-do/education-and-leadership-programmes/next-generation-leaders/igf-ambassadors-programme/Past-Ambassadors>
& Mexico
<http://www.internetsociety.org/what-we-do/education-and-leadership-programmes/next-generation-leaders/Current-Ambassadors>)
- AFRISIG 2016 <http://afrisig.org/afrisig-2016/class-of-2016/> - Blogger
<http://tungali.blogspot.com/> - ICANN Fellow (Los Angeles
<https://www.icann.org/news/announcement-2014-07-18-en> & Marrakech
<https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/marrakech55-attendees-2016-03-14-en>
). AFRINIC Fellow (Mauritius
<http://www.afrinic.net/en/library/news/1907-afrinic-25-fellowship-winners>)*
- *IGFSA Member <http://www.igfsa.org/> - Internet Governance - Internet
Freedom.

Check the 2016 State of Internet Freedom in DRC report
<http://cipesa.org/?wpfb_dl=234>

2017-04-12 15:20 GMT+02:00 Mukom Akong T. <mukom.tamon at gmail.com>:

**wearing NO hat**

On 12 April 2017 at 14:02, Barrack Otieno <otieno.barrack at gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Mukom,

Understood, i raised this point because i am aware of the fact that it has
not been easy to get the Afrinic Government working group going and this
could be a great area of engaging this group since most of the shutdowns
can be attributed to lack of knowledge by key actors and sheer ignorance.

The job of building capacity with governments is important and definitely
will continue - not just from AFRINIC, but also from other stake-holders -
irrespective of the outcome of this proposal. But that's a side issue.

As a key stakeholder it would be  great idea to include them in this
conversation.

I don't see any attempt to exclude them. The AFRINIC PDP is open to all.
Each and every person that has ever been to the AFGWG knows about this
mailing list and how to take part in it. I'm hoping that they are following
and we'll be seeing contributions from them soon (some already have
responded)

My point was that there's no room in the PDP for the community to wait
ad-infinitum for a response from them.

The proposal is well intentioned but the outcome might be in the interest
of proponents of Internet shutdowns.

It would greatly enhance this discussion if you could state how this will
be in their interest.

-- 

Mukom Akong T.

LinkedIn:Mukom <https://www.linkedin.com/in/mukom>  |  twitter:
@perfexcellent

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“When you work, you are the FLUTE through whose lungs the whispering of the
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