ITU’s Upcoming Internet Treaty Conference Opposed by European Parliament

We recently reported that Google has launched a page criticizing the efforts of International Telecommunications Union (ITU) to give the governments a greater control over internet. Members of the European Parliament have cited similar concerns now.


ITU

According to the reports and several documents, leaked ahead of this conference that is due to take place during December, it has been discovered that Russia is actively pursuing reforms in the regulation of internet. It essentially wants greater control over the internet and the ability to censor, manipulate and monitor the flow of internet traffic in its territory.

Governments such as China have also backed the proposal. But tech companies, such as Google, have vehemently opposed it. The opposition stems from the danger that non-liberal governments around the world, such as those in Russia and China, will be able to censor what they want and when they want on the web once they have this control.

Members of the European Parliament have now cited the same concerns, penning them down into a resolution which declares that such changes to ITU’s regulations must be rejected which may “negatively impact the internet, its architecture, operations, content and security, business relations, internet governance and the free flow of information online.”

ITU seems to be weighing heavily in favor of Kremlin, yet the agency can’t make any effective changes into the regulations governing internet until there is a consensus among all member countries. And that doesn’t seem to be happening as of this moment.

Source: European Parliament

Courtesy: BBC

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Salman

Salman Latif is a software engineer with a specific interest in social media, big data and real-world solutions using the two.Other than that, he is a bit of a gypsy. He also writes in his own blog. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter .

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