The importance of the internet to our modern society and its current issues
Ever since its creation, the importance of the internet has been constantly growing every passing year, with new platforms and new tools being developed on a non stop basis, and an increasing number of people spending more of their time in the digital world. It is fair to say this technology has earned its position in the center stage of our current lives because everything of what we do, is one way or another registered in the internet, every transaction and a lot of our decisions end up being stored someplace in the net, which is why this tool could be considered as one of the most important ones there is, if not the most important one.
However, despite all the advantages it brings to everyone of us, and all the ways the internet has to make our lives easier, it is not perfect. Due to its centralized nature, there is the possibility of single entities leveraging their power and influence to control and manipulate what type of information can be consumed on the net.
There are specific examples of this all over the world with governments that don’t respect citizen’s freedom, and use their power to simply block certain websites that they happen to find as inconvenient for their interests. Specific examples of this are China and Venezuela, where people are getting use to being completely at the mercy of their government whims when it comes to freely consuming digital information.
I experience this first hand because I live in Venezuela, and it is no surprise to find certain websites blocked for sharing information that could hurt the government’s credibility and reputation, by blocking these websites they expect to avoid this delicate information to be known inside the country and keep people ignorant regarding these facts.
But governments are not the only type of entity that can abuse their power to control which information is consumed and which is ignored by the masses, internet providers can certainly do the same as a way of favoring the consumption of content in the platforms where they have economic interests, a specific example was reported by Wired:
AT&T already lets you watch its DirecTV Now video service without having it count against your data plan, but watching Netflix or Hulu still chews through your limit. | Source
This is why net neutrality was created in the first place, it consists in ensuring internet providers treat all data flows equally, without favoring some websites over others and giving equal speed to every connection there is. However, in December 2017 net neutrality was repelled and as of now it remains like that.
Another major issue that exists is how people’s privacy is handled. The majority of websites and internet companies use ads to monetize online content, and in order to make the user interested when displaying the ads, they need to gather enough information to create an online profile about that particular user and display relevant ads based on this profile. The negative aspect of this dynamic is that these companies will do whatever it takes to find access to this information, even to the point of not respecting people’s privacy. Which is exactly what happened with Facebook and Cambridge Analytica, where information about millions of people with Facebook profiles(including info about their Facebook friends) was used without them being aware of it. This was done in order to “build psychological profiles on a large portion of the U.S. electorate”. | Source
And the same can be said about government agencies such as the NSA and all the methods they have to, in every sense of the word, spy on people, as was disclosed by Edward Snowden a few years ago.
Every single one of these problems, being basically lack of proper freedom and privacy regarding internet use, are possible because of the centralized nature of the internet. Up until this point, mostly everything worked on a centralized way, there wasn’t another option when approaching the development of different platforms and projects, but that is no longer the case.
After the creation of Bitcoin in 2009, there has been an incredibly high amount of new decentralized developments, looking to disrupt every single industry there is, and Decenternet is the one capable of solving each and every issue mentioned in the previous paragraphs.
What is Decenternet and how can it provide future-proof protection for people’s freedom and privacy?
Decenternet, according to its whitepaper, can be defined as:
... the most powerful complete hyper-speed P2P distributed Internet infrastructure solution platform that Blockchain technology can create. It doesn’t belong or report to any third-party organization except to its users | Source
By not reporting to any entity with interests that differ from those of its users, it is impossible to experience a lack of freedom when searching for information that is available on this network. There won’t be anyone manipulating or controlling access based on the type of data, and everything will be accessible without favoring any content nor suppressing any information.
It will operate completely independently, and it will even use its own currency called Spyce that will be used to do any type of typical transactions like for example “purchase hosting services, apps, or goods, or process micropayments with ease.” Source
Spyce will be created by mining activities anyone can do with common computers, which can ensure proper decentralization for the long term, because anyone willing to participate in this activity will be able to do so without needing to invest in an extremely powerful computer. The mining protocol that allows this to happen is so far only implemented in this project, it is called Proof-of-Reliability (POR) and will let anyone to mine Spyce based on how reliable their node is.
Under these circumstances, the possibility of a single entity enforcing control and manipulating the consumption and the availability of certain data is zero. All the content will always be available for users and by users with no censorship whatsoever.
When it comes to personal information, there will no one spying on the users because those backdoors employed for this type of activities will be non existent in the Decenternet’s network, this protection can be expanded even further by the use of the ANUVYZ operative system that will be discussed in the next article.
Summary
The internet is one the most important tools ever created by humanity, allowing all sort of new possibilities to expand our knowledge, however, there are issues with certain entities having too much power and influence over what type of content “should” be consumed, and they use said power to manipulate in all sort of ways which content is available and which is not. Besides, there are privacy violations perpetuated by government agencies as well as private corporations, where they gather data without the user being aware of it, this is clearly an unacceptable abusive behavior.
All of these problems can potentially be solved by the Decenternet network, where decentralization is guarantee thanks to the Proof-of-Reliability protocol that allows for any user to provide their own node for the network without needing to invest in extremely expensive computers, and since this is designed to work as a P2P network, there won’t be any entity distorting the data flow between the content and the consumer.
If you want to know more about this project, feel free to:
- Check out Decenternet’s website
- Check out ANUVYS website
- Follow the Decenternet Facebook page
- Follow the Decenternet Twitter page
- Join the Decenternet Telegram group
“DISCLAMER: The information contained within this post shall not be taken as financial advice. I am not a financial advisor and none of your investing should be carried out based on any information presented here. You can lose all of your money by investing. The following information is for educational and entertainment purposes only.”
Great Blog @dedicatedguy. As you are from Venezuela, did you get the chance to read about Project Liberati It is mentioned in the 70 Page whitepaper they have on the website. Countries like Venezuela experienced a 4000% inflation rate in 2017. Dnet team has decided to set aside 1 little grain of spyce for each Venezuelan citizen from the city of Caracas until year 2025 and release them as a donation for the public. You might find this very intriguing. :-) and probably follow this activity when it happens! Cheers.
Hello friend, @hambriento I live in Caracas-Venezuela and I would like to read about the project you could help me to get that information, thank you blessings
Check this Whitepaper of Decenternet: - https://decenternet.com/white-paper/
Open Full 70 Page Whitepaper and see Project Liberati. :-) @isma4617
Thank you very much friend, I'll look for it, I appreciate it.
Yes, but it said that was only for Caracas, and I don't live there (at least some family members do live there). Either way, it is excellent to see projects paying attention to the horrible situation in Venezuela and being willing to help.
Posted on the subreddit about net neutrality
And twitter
An interesting concept, article built with referral links to what is actually happening, we do need to protect our privacy.
Scraping information from the internet has become common, no matter whether they feel it is for marketing or otherwise it is not right.
I sometimes get the feeling that some people don't mind having their privacy being constantly violated. This is certainly a topic that could be discussed further, but maybe current generations are already conditioned to share absolutely everything about their lives on the net, and don't feel threaten being spied on, maybe they don't understand the risk of not having privacy.
Not too sure about that, most of the younger generation want privacy via messenger services, giving an email address to obtain. Some move from for example What's App to Telegram believing one to be more secure than the other for sending messages privately.
On the other hand some people will post breakfast, lunch and supper out to the world forgetting to switch off Geo-location, which is extremely dangerous in our world today.
Blockchain technology is being promoted as private and secure, again somewhere along the line you divulge your email/phone credentials, an IP address is traceable, just how much privacy do we have in this world today, is a worrying reality.
Listening into your life and what you do is big business! My respect goes to people like Edward Snowden and other whistle blowers against the powers that be.
"The internet, our greatest tool of emancipation, has been transformed into the most dangerous facilitator of totalitarianism we have ever seen." - Julian Assange
Here's to hoping Decenternet succeeds!
Excellent quote @cryptobro69, thanks for sharing it!
Fantastic read. Thanks for this. The decentralised internet is going to make the future bright for many currently opressed users.
You are right with that @steveblucher, freedom can be increased through technological means.
About time something like this was built.
And to think back in the day they said the internet wouldn't catch on. Haha
👍
Technology always ends up being surprising, it just needs time.
this is an interesting idea. its worth giving a try. just want to know about it privacy policy and the protective/security tools in place. thumbs up
Good blog post. Very well written.
Thanks for your kind words.
When seeing how things are going in the world right now, this is something we obviously need. Censorship is more like a propaganda.
Thank you for sharing this!
Exactly, technology like this one could be useful for so many people all over the world.
Its it jewish?:D
It's a very good idea to make the Internet decentralized. I really look forward to this future))
It is @amalinavia, this future is closer that we might think.
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