 Found a word you're not familiar with? Double-click that word to bring up a dictionary reference to it. The dictionary page includes an audio sound file with which to actually hear the word said. |
Further implications
The current controversy involving TikTok reveals the fragility of the Internet as a means of global communication. It demonstrates ideological differences, conflicting economic interests and political distrust prompting the establishment of digital silos and threatening the continued existence of the internet as a means of whole world communication.A silo in IT is an isolated point in a system where data is kept segregated (on purpose or accidentally) from other parts of an organization's information and communications network.
The term silo is typically used in a relatively restricted sense to refer to the breaking of digital links within an individual company or organisation; however, data silos also exist across the internet as a whole. As increasing numbers of firewalls have been erected restricting internet access to within specific countries, the term 'splinternet' is coming to be used. 'Splinternet' (also termed cyberbalkanisation) refers to the fragmented internet, a set of isolated pieces with communication barriers between them. China is a primary example of a nation that has erected digital communication barriers blocking information and services from other nations. These barriers are commonly referred to as the Great Firewall. The Great Firewall operates by checking incoming transmission packets for keywords that are seen as indicating sensitive content. If the keywords or sensitive words appear in the packets, access is closed. The effect includes limiting access to foreign information sources, blocking foreign internet tools (e.g., Google Search, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, and others) and mobile apps, and requiring foreign companies to adapt to domestic regulations.
China has its own platforms which replicate services provided by Google and Facebook. People in China use Baidu as their search engine. The most common Chinese video streaming platform is Tencent, and the most popular social media platform is Weibo. Services are provided to Chinese users; however, access to communication outside China is not. This is seen as regrettable because it limits freedom of information and thought.Critics of attempts to force TikTok to sell their product to an American buyer claim that this will accelerate the splintering of the internet. For example, when India banned TikTok in 2020 it was proposed that the app be purchased by an Indian company.
It has been suggested that this sell to us or be banned strategy may result in TikTok being splintered into different locally owned companies within countries where it is currently under challenge. Mark Zuckerberg, whose company Meta produces Facebook and Instagram, has warned of the possible negative repercussions of either a ban or a forced sale of TikTok. He has stated, 'I am really worried...it could very well have long-term consequences in other countries around the world.' Behind Zuckerberg's concern is likely to be about the effect on his own company. Already, Facebook has been either permanently or temporarily banned in 20 countries, not including China. This raises the possibility that other disputed platforms, like Facebook, might also be sold off to local digital companies and so lose their global reach. The same danger of a narrowing national focus exists with TikTok's Project Texas plan whereby all TikTok user data is to be stored on American soil in Oracle, a cloud-based, American-owned storage facility. This is simply another form of fragmentation and silo building, reducing the reach of the platform to within national borders. And the trend is likely to extend beyond TikTok. In an opinion piece published in Wired on March 18, 2022, Matt Perault wrote, 'If the US government succeeds in forcing TikTok to enter this local data-storing arrangement with Oracle, other governments will be more likely to impose comparable requirements on US companies operating within their borders.'
Those who see the internet as a framework for the fee flow of ideas and information are distressed by the direction the world is taking, where increasing numbers of states are attempting to restrict individual platforms (or the total internet architecture) to a model that only operates within their own borders. On March 28, 2023, The Guardian published a comment by Emily Taylor, an associate fellow in the International Security Programme, Chatham House. Taylor stated, 'Advanced democracies have an opportunity to have a grown-up debate on how to hold a global internet together while respecting political differences, protecting free expression and supporting the most vulnerable. Instead, the incredible benefits of our shared digital architecture are being washed away in thoughtless, kneejerk responses to the economic and political rise of China.'