By Aaron F. Brantly
Grateful Dead Lyricist John Perry Barlow once wrote in “A Declaration of the Independence for Cyberspace” of a potential place free from state intervention where a new social contract might arise in the absence of privilege and prejudice, economic power, military force, and station of birth. Regrettably, Barlow’s vision has not come to pass. Instead, cyberspace has been invaded by all those qualities he sought independence from and more. Writing following a contentious election in the United States (US) and amidst a pandemic that has forced billions to work and socially interact intermediate through technologies, it is difficult not to question whether cyberspace has itself become in so many ways a diseased space, where the worst qualities of humanity are cultivated.
Although cyberspace has been used to mobilize citizens against corrupt and repressive governments, it has similarly become a vector for oppression and dis-and-misinformation. Cyberspace is reshaping our world, yet the dark underbelly of information manipulations that course through its social networks, search engines, and forums undermines our confidence in our political, economic, and social institutions. The problem of disinformation is not isolated to failures of governments, social media or news organizations, it is also an individual, human-level problem. Addressing the problem across levels of analysis is crucial to treating not only the symptoms of information manipulations, but also its causes. As individuals, businesses, and governments, the question of what can be done to safeguard our collective digital future against the pervasive threat of mis-and-disinformation that threatens our security must be asked.
First, we must recognize that many of the problems we face are not unique to cyberspace nor entirely new. Disinformation and misinformation in their modern form have been going on for decades with a great deal of success in countries all around the world. Understanding how we have dealt with information manipulations prior to cyberspace offers insights into how we can address it in cyberspace. Second, what is new is the volume and velocity, as well as the breadth and scope of information manipulations. Cyberspace and its associated technologies amplify these challenges by orders of magnitude over their historical precursors. Third, we must ensure that our efforts to remediate these pernicious problems are not worse than the problems themselves.
Understanding the historical context of the problems we are now experiencing in and through cyberspace frames their impact and minimizes hyperbole. For example, the BBC and the US Information Agency, among other like organizations, were used in the post-WWII period to counter Soviet information activities with reasonable effectiveness. But it wasn’t these organizations alone that facilitated success. Good governance, robust democratic institutions, a strong and independent press, and an active civil society were central to protecting against information manipulations. When these core pillars of strong democracies are undermined, it doesn’t matter what platforms are available; society will be exposed and weakened by information manipulations.
Further complicating the challenge of information flows is the commodification of the recipients of that information in what Shoshana Zuboff calls surveillance capitalism. Because information is commoditized, its market value becomes more important than its validity. This leads firms that specialize in surveillance capitalism to create algorithms that emphasize monetary gain at the expense of social, economic, and societal security. Moreover, it privileges the need for high volume and high-velocity dataflows often at the expense of a critical examination of those flows. Virality, the rapid dissemination of content, is highly prized and can substantially increase both revenues from advertising and information capital derived from user interactions with content. Mark Zuckerberg's “move fast and break things” motto for Facebook is emblematic of these behaviors. What is being broken is not limited to technological limits on innovation, but the very social ties that bind societies together.
Increases in information volume and velocity undermine the success of purely human responses to the present challenges. Netizens around the world now access news and information via social media, online news platforms, and many other venues. Laws and regulations on information in cyberspace differ between countries. Divergent national approaches to a common problem highlight the unique challenges and values of each polity. Nations that fear information, have worked tirelessly to wall off their domestic cyberspaces. To do this, they have created immense state-managed or co-opted censorship organs that filter and censor content. A large middle group of nations have implemented more robust laws or regulations to force the policing of platforms for deliberately false or misleading information, and limited dissemination of certain types of information. The US position, in stark contrast to most other nations, places a high value on the free flow of information regardless of its validity. The spectrum of national responses to the pervasive problem of mis-and-disinformation underscores the tension between individual liberty, societal stability, and national values.
Nations broadly form blocks within Internet governance organizations in an attempt to shape global norms on information in cyberspace. Nations with more repressive information environments highlight the concept of information sovereignty, while nations in the middle to libertarian block highlight the value and need for the free flow of information. Processes like the United Nations Governmental Group of Experts (UN GGE) have been undertaken in the hopes of bridging the normative gaps between nations. Yet, while some progresshas been made, the processes have largely failed to facilitate consensus.
The problem of mis-and-disinformation is immense. States, non-state actors, domestic political actors, and malcontents of all shapes and sizes are engaged in weaponizing information. The result is that Barlow’s vision of a space of freedom and hope has become in some ways a nightmare. Yet the solution is not as Barlow suggests, states should not recuse themselves from involvement. Nor should states be the only actors involved in the solution. Rather the solution is multi-faceted. It is inclusive of fostering more equitable and civically engaged domestic constituencies that develop what Robert Putnam refers to as social capital. Social capital will not inoculate individuals against malicious information, but it will make them more resistantto it. Second, conscientious and forward-thinking laws and regulations provide boundaries and guidelines to which both public and private entities must adhere. Where law and regulation are necessary states should step in as they have done with increasing effectiveness in the European Union in particular with the passage of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Where laws and regulations fail to address specific platforms or forms of information, governments should engage in public-private partnerships. Such partnerships should be inclusive of multi-stakeholder dialogues on issues or concern across communities and constituencies. Such dialogue will provide both private actors and governments insights into the impact that information technologies have on political, economic and social institutions. Often these types of dialogues take place internal to states, but there are a number of forums that have taken place over the years including the Internet Governance Forum where these and other challenges frequently arise.
Cyberspace is sick. But it is not dead. It suffers from a chronic, but a manageable disease. A disease that reared its head before cyberspace and will continue well into the future. Minimizing the impact of dis-and-misinformation is a long-term endeavor. Current Internet governance regimes are ill-suited to address the problem globally, but collections of nations - sharing similar values - can and must work to steadily to treat the symptoms of the disease before it becomes fatal.