Internet Filtering Essay Example

the few companies that have severed their ties with china and moved stopped self-censoring its search engine.

Google stated that the reason for severing its ties happened when an internet hack occurred that originated for china. The PRC also blocks social network and notable news sites in order to keep only what they want in their country allowed. Now setting in place filter from my company would help the government keep their control over what content gets filtered in and out of their firewalls. That it could help safe guard information that the PRC deems unsafe and threatens national security. It would also censor negative comments against the government and protect a revolution.

In a way it could also prevent crimes by limiting the negative and disturbing things the population can view. Putting a filter designed by a private company could come at a cost though. The people of the nation would have their information come at a minimum and they would only get a biased view of the world. Also in keeping up with protecting national security it wouldn’t help the company’s reputation if something went bad. Say for example the Geneva Convention passed a law saying that filtering out information for one’s personal gain was illegal.

Then the ramifications would come back on the said company for participating in such an activity. In another stand point, the population could possible turn against the company. They could boycott any of their products and slander their name. Also, people should have a more broaden sense of view about the world, not just what a government and its protocols want it to know. Activists have been fighting for years

to free the world and give everyone knowledge. If word was to get out that the filter was in place by another company then it would ruin itself to the ground.

Ethically there are two sides to the story here, the government and the people themselves. As the world is ever changing and people become more and more vocal, it becomes more of a challenge for the country to stop everything. Some would argue that no filtering should be in place and that all information should be know, regardless of what harm may or may not come from the information itself becoming exposed. While others, mostly the government, argue that necessary steps need to be in place in order to safe guard the people.

The people in the nation and most of the world think that controlling a person life is immoral and shouldn’t be allowed on any level at all. That freedom should reign on all walks of life and that people should makes choices for what they want to see or keep hidden away. Some of the things being blocked do put a certain problem for everyone. When the government blocked the Urumqi riot back in 2009 it was to stop the fear that the country was falling apart and chaos was starting.

The government also uses filtering as a way to control and steer the population to liking one thing and hating another. Thus, creating a kind of controlled society where no one has an opinion. World news agencies such as BBC, CNN, and Fox news are frequently blocked by the filters, so that only the information that was allowed to be read could be.

Other methods include broadcast delay, chilling effect, propaganda model, book burning and pixelization. These are relatively new forms of misleading information that have aroused because of technology.

Technology has done many great things over the years. From the first ever rock being used as a tool to now a car being able to run off hydrogen. It has also done harm that has not always been intentional. From creating a bullet that can fit in your hand, or creating a bomb that started out as a energy source. People for hundreds of years have always been debating about the use of technology and how it can be good or bad, but technology is not the problem it’s the people using it. A bullet on its own is not going to fire itself at a crowd of kids and kill them.

A bomb won’t drop itself on top of a crowd of un-expecting people and destroy all forms of life. In the same sense was a rock every going to be used a tool to bash things or formed into a spear to kill an animal for food. People may claim that technology is an evil that will always be negative, but more responsibility should be laid on the people that use it. Technology brings about ways to control and mislead and it also helps and guides, so accepting a contract would bring out both sides of the sword. Accepting this contract wouldn’t be for my company or for me personally.

I could not see myself throwing away my life’s work just for a buck. In the beginning of accepting the contract the money and the sense of a

challenge would be nice, but it could harm my company in the future. The government may love what I do but the people that want freedom for all races and religions could slander and sling my reputation to the ground. It wouldn’t bother me what I had to filter or block because, you’re making someone mad when you stop them from getting the information that they want.

I remember being in school and having a filter stop me from searching some things just for a report that I had for class. It would turn me against the rules and regulations of the schools internet usage policy and make me find every way I could to get around them. I would backdoor IPs, uses an IP blocker, use a proxy, or even just use a copy of Linux and ghost boot to get around. Yes the things I did where wrong but it only proves a point that people evolve and find a way. That even when a company or an organization thinks that they have it shutdown, people will find a way around it.

It’s one of the basic laws of civilization that humans will evolve and adapt to what they have and make it better or get around it. So I don’t want to be on the receiving end of an irate nation striking down on you because we didn’t make want they want perfect. It would cripple my company no matter what wither the nation gets mad that people found a way around, or if the activist plunged my company into the red with slander. I’m not trying to say that it is going to

happen like that, but history has shown us that it is more than likely to happen.

It has happened to many companies that try to take a risk and fail; they even fail from the inside of the company. Just like what happened to Enron back in 2001, when there was a massive scandal. So maybe the responsibility should lie upon another company, maybe a startup company that’s not afraid to take a risk. Starter companies are more able to take that kind of a crippling risk. They can just start over as a new name, because it’s harder for a big company like Cisco. A bigger company has already established their name in the market and is well know.

Smaller companies are not known and have fewer losses. I wouldn’t feel responsible if another company took the contract, it would seem more of a relief if I didn’t. I wouldn’t have to worry about my company being in harm’s way. Sure another company would have to deal with the pressure of the job, but if my company doesn’t do it then someone will. Everyone has a price at which they will complete a task, it is just finding that number or criteria and implementing it. If it really came to pass that it was my company or another I still don’t think I would take the contract.

To me it seems that limiting a person on what they can learn shouldn’t be allowed. That everyone no matter who they are should have access to nearly anything. Yes sure ethics are on both sides of this argument but there is a moral standard. It is a moral standard

that people shouldn’t be told what to do every day that we should be given choice. Now yes those people are living in a communist country that has those standards. Wither it is by choice or simply that they are not allowed leaving, there are still things that they can do to bring about their own form of government.