IGF 2022 WS #342 Protecting a Global Internet in an Age of Economic Sanctions

Chris Buckridge from RIPE-NCC introduced the topic of Internet sanctions. Followed by a presentation by Farzaneh Badii, with a historic overview of how sanctions regimes have become more sophisticated and targeted. Specifically, she mentioned impact of sanctions on: a) Regional Internet Registries; b) inequitable access to number resources; c) network operators; d) DNS. Nathalie Jaarsma, Cyber Ambassador from The Netherlands, explained that sanctions are a legitimate policy tool. She also explained the concept of public core, that her country has been advocating in the UN to foster responsible State behaviours and prevent attacks to public core infrastructure. She also advocates for the governance of the public core to be conducted in a multistakeholder fashion. Sanctions are dealt in a different area from the cyber silo, and they come under a lot of time-pressure. Sanctions are, in the view of The Netherlands, a means to change the behaviour of another country. The impact is not always looked at in a very complete or comprehensive way. Sometimes citizens might be deprived from access to the Internet. Jane Coffin from Connect Humanity shared a story about equipment for Internet Exchange Points being donated to developing countries. This equipment cannot be shipped to countries under sanction regimes, with penalties to the non-for-profits that donate them. Coordinating these shipments of equipment in countries that are sanctioned is very onerous, as well as inviting participants from these countries to events, becoming daunting and off-putting for organisations that mean well. Dawit Bekele from the Internet Society also shared stories about technical support to countries like Sudan and consequences to the Internet. Also he mentioned that sanctions may have the unintended consequence of fostering Internet fragmentation, sovereign national intranets. Alexander Isavnin, talked about impact of sanctions on users and further Internet fragmentation in countries in conflict. Nathalia Foditsch talked about the impact of the US embargo in Cuba resulting in low quality Internet connectivity, which also have an effect in freedom of expression in the country.  Moving into potential solutions, Farzaneh mentioned immunity as a consideration, for example, to ICANN and RIRs, so for them to be able to operate globally without being affected by sanction regimes. To a question in the chat from Marilia Maciel, about not only economic sanctions, but also trade restrictions, Farzaneh talked about the security and the security updates of the equipments and how these restrictions can also affect availability of service and connectivity. Farzaneh also talked about treaty protections to national post offices that protect the traffic of parcels, while she did not advocate for a treaty based solution for Internet sanctions. She asked what are the Internet services that, if sanctioned, can reduce the online presence of individuals.  There was a question in the room about humanitarian impact of unilaterally imposed measures. There was another comment in the room in support of sanctions in Russia and that misinformation is not a consequence of fragmented Internet due to sanctions, but a failure of civil society and digital rights activists. There was a counterargument that sanctions affect innocent citizens and the flow of information. A conversation continued in how much resilient the Internet is, and how difficult it was to prevent content blocking, as network operators were over compliant with local regulations. Nathalie Jaarsma explained that sanctions are always political, but they need to consider proportionality and their impact needs to be thoroughly considered, as well as how exemptions should be handled and help from the multistakeholder community should be welcomed. The session concluded with a suggestion to have a multistakeholder approach to map the chain of effects of sanctions.