US Refuses To Sign ITU Treaty Over Internet Provisions 154
An anonymous reader writes "The United States said today that it will not sign an international telecommunications treaty thanks to the inclusion of Internet-related provisions. According to the BBC, the U.K. and Canada have also pledged not to sign the treaty in its current form, while delegates from Denmark, the Czech Republic, Sweden, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Costa Rica, and Kenya also have reservations."
Re:Treaties (Score:4, Insightful)
Thanks for condensing every anti-American platitude into a single post for easy two-minutes of hate consumption. You get bonus points for using Star Wars references while citing exactly zero facts to support your arguments and pointing out exactly zero treaties that the U.S. has "violated".
Re:Treaties (Score:5, Insightful)
Not signing a treaty in the first place because you don't like whats in it is a sound and rational thing to do.
The US is doing absolutely nothing wrong in this case.
Re:Treaties (Score:4, Insightful)
The types who have been following news on things like Guantanamo.
Re:Treaties (Score:3, Insightful)
The merits of the ITU being involved in Internet protocol discussions aside, the notion that the Internet is some kind of anarchic, ungoverned, network that's not "owned" by any group, groups, or governments, is a ludicrous meme that has no basis in reality.
Every user of the Internet is governed by, at the very least, their local laws, and frequently affected, if not bound by, the laws of governments they would otherwise not normally be associated with. Content on the Internet is frequently censored, and people have suffered penalties from enormous fines to actual imprisonment, due exclusively to things they did online. ISPs are, actually, required to abide by local laws, and frequently are compelled to take a role in law enforcement, be that simply giving up names, or in some countries, filtering content and identifying people who attempt to get hold of content legislated as illegal.
Given that, the uproar about the notion that the ITU - which is hardly a political body and thus far has never made any decision you could reasonably suggest is content based - might be involved in provisioning the Internet because somehow it means the UN now governs the Internet - is faintly ridiculous. Nobody is going to deported to a dictatorship from their home country thanks to any rules imposed by the UN or ITU. And Kony (or whoever the Godwin-violation of the week is) isn't going to be able to take down criticisms of him hosted on US websites thanks to decisions by the UN.
There may be legitimate reasons to oppose the ITU's involvement in the Internet. The "If the ITU is involved, the Internet will be governed by POL POT!!!" one really isn't.
Re:Treaties (Score:5, Insightful)
Not to say this is a US specific thing, it is probably a product of having enough power to ignore rules and not be stopped.. so the US gets highlight since we have quite a bit of power (both economic and military) so we end up on the 'winning' side of such violations more often then not.
Re:Didn't we BUILD the damn thing? (Score:4, Insightful)
We built it, it's ours.
No see when I pay for something it's not yours anymore, it's mine. I realize that this is an archaic notion and every day the people who build things are trying to retain control of their cars/smart-phones/computer software/etc. But I'm an older person and not afraid to tell young whiper-snappers to get fucked. Don't worry, I'll be dead soon. By that time you'll realize what the next generation has cooked up just especially to screw you. We each get our turn.
WTF with the title (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously? "US Refuses To Sign ITU Treaty Over Internet Provisions" is the title of this piece?
From what I could tell, even TFSummary mentions multiple countries refuse to sign. But, "OMG! Teh Un1t3d 5t4t3s refusors to p3n h4x moar documents! Roooaarrr!!1"
A more sensationalist title I've not seen on /. for a while.
How about a more neutral tone for story summaries? Maybe, I don't know:
Multiple countries fail to agree on ITU Treaty
Multiple countries disagree on ITU Treaty content
Differences still exist between countries involved in ITU Treaty
ITU Treaty content to undergo more revisions
sheesh.
Re:Treaties (Score:5, Insightful)
Withdrawing from a treaty is not the same as violating it. In international law, the rule of thumb is that a country is only obligated to comply with the laws (treaties) it has ratified, and is not bound by those that it has not ratified. (Note: One debatable exception to this is the Nuremberg Principles [wikipedia.org])
Furthermore, countries are free to withdraw from ("repudiate") any treaty at any time, unless that treaty has provisions that provide specific steps for (or prohibit) repudiation.
Re:Treaties (Score:5, Insightful)
Guantanamo Bay, for example, is a violation of numerous Geneva Conventions.
Have you actually read the Geneva Convention (which one)? You should at least read the first page or two of one of them before you comment. In order to be afforded the protections of the Geneva convention, several things need to happen.
The combatant needs to be a member of the armed forces of a sovereign state that signed the treaty. They need to be in uniform or clearly marked as being in the military. They need to be carrying their arms openly. They need to be under clear military command and control. A state of war needs to exist between the two sovereign states. The terrorists in Gitmo meet none of these conditions.
If you want to be afforded the protections of a Treaty, you have to follow the rules and meet the conditions of the treaty. Here is a news flash for you: Terrorists don't follow the rules.