At 3pmET yesterday, it appears that Google Cloud (affecting Gmail, YouTube, SnapChat, Instagram, and Facebook among others) mysteriously (and almost unprecedently) went offline.
This brought to mind Obama’s Executive Order just in case you think this is a tin foil hat thing. Congress had big plans too.
Incident began at 2019-06-02 12:25 (all times are US/Pacific).
Jun 02, 20 12:25 We are investigating an issue with Google Compute Engine. We will provide more information by Sunday, 2019-06-02 12:45 US/Pacific.
One Google insider explains (via YCombinator):
I work on Google Cloud (but disclaimer, I’m on vacation and so not much use to you!).
We’re having what appears to be a serious networking outage. It’s disrupting everything, including unfortunately the tooling we usually use to communicate across the company about outages.
There are backup plans, of course, but I wanted to at least come here to say: you’re not crazy, nothing is lost (to those concerns downthread), but there is serious packet loss at the least. You’ll have to wait for someone actually involved in the incident to say more.
The internet is having a very bad day… Zero Hedge and more of the details and a tip of the hat.
If you think this couldn’t happen, check back at what Obama and Congress had in mind a few years ago.
Presidential powers over the Internet and telecommunications were laid out in a U.S. Senate bill in 2009, which proposed handing the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet. But that legislation was not included in the Cybersecurity Act of 2012. I caught some discussion of this at the time, and the rationale was that “misinformation” may need to be curtailed. Where did I hear that before? Anyone still wondering where we are headed with this?
President Obama signed an executive order the week of July 12, 2012 that could give him control over the web in times of emergency.
According to The Verge, critics of the order are concerned with Section 5.2, which is a lengthy part outlining how telecommunications and the Internet are controlled. It states that the Secretary of Homeland Security will “oversee the development, testing, implementation, and sustainment” of national security and emergency preparedness measures on all systems, including private “non-military communications networks.” According to The Verge, critics say this gives Obama the on/off switch to the Web.
The order, known as the, “Assignment of National Security and Emergency Preparedness Communications Functions,” exists to hand over full control of communications and the internet to certain government authorities in times of natural disaster and security emergencies.
The wording for the executive order is of course lengthy and uses politician language, but the part worth pointing out is in section 5.2. It is in this section that the order states that Homeland Security will be able to monitor and control all non-military forms of communications in times of extreme measures, which is essentially giving the White House the on/off switch to the internet, according to some critics.
You can read more about the executive order, which still had 30 days before it became a law, over at CNET and The Verge. If you want to check out the order in its entirety, go to the White House press page.
It was a good day in the swamp.
Bonus:
Executive Order — National Defense Resources Preparedness
In a nutshell, it’s the blueprint for Peacetime Martial Law and it gives the president the power to take just about anything deemed necessary for “National Defense”, whatever they decide that is. It’s peacetime, because as the title of the order says, it’s for “Preparedness”.
Quote:
Sec. 201. Priorities and Allocations Authorities. (a) The authority of the President conferred by section 101 of the Act, 50 U.S.C. App. 2071, to require acceptance and priority performance of contracts or orders (other than contracts of employment) to promote the national defense over performance of any other contracts or orders, and to allocate materials, services, and facilities as deemed necessary or appropriate to promote the national defense, is delegated to the following agency heads:(1) the Secretary of Agriculture with respect to food resources, food resource facilities, livestock resources, veterinary resources, plant health resources, and the domestic distribution of farm equipment and commercial fertilizer;(2) the Secretary of Energy with respect to all forms of energy;(3) the Secretary of Health and Human Services with respect to health resources;(4) the Secretary of Transportation with respect to all forms of civil transportation;(5) the Secretary of Defense with respect to water resources; and(6) the Secretary of Commerce with respect to all other materials, services, and facilities, including construction materials |
Thanks WhatFingerNews for the coverage! A great site for all the news.
August 2, 2019 at 5:07 pm
This only substantiates my distrust of the tech companies. Most of them are in bed with the government any how.
https://invertedlogicblog.wordpress.com/2019/08/02/paragraph-polemics14what-is-the-correct-amount-of-governmental-authority/
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June 9, 2019 at 5:47 am
[…] Was the Government internet ‘Kill Switch’ just tested? […]
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June 5, 2019 at 6:52 am
It was not the ‘system’ being tested, but rather the cannon fodder.
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June 4, 2019 at 6:15 pm
[…] Was the Government internet ‘Kill Switch’ just tested? […]
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June 4, 2019 at 7:19 am
I had service through that time period.
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June 4, 2019 at 8:20 am
It apparently wasn’t a problem throughout the US….
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June 4, 2019 at 3:51 am
on may 31st the DOJ announced it was starting an investigation into Google.. Google could have shutdown its servers and erased all its nefarious activities (bleach bit) … and we know they have been doing lots of creative anti american activities..in order to hide their crimes….
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June 4, 2019 at 5:48 am
Google is a plague on our government. There were a dozen or more good search engines in the beginning. Where did they all go?
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June 4, 2019 at 11:04 am
Try DuckDuckGo
It works real well
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August 5, 2019 at 2:04 pm
I have been using DuckDuckGo for the reason that it does not track your searches.
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June 3, 2019 at 9:14 pm
I guess I was too busy working to notice 🙂
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June 3, 2019 at 6:33 pm
I wouldn’t be surprised at all if that is what happened.
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June 3, 2019 at 7:11 pm
Dump Google and All its affiliates! (((CIA))) assets.
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June 3, 2019 at 7:57 pm
Ken… right on.. Google is Obama’s BFF…and was deep into the Arab Spring. Add Hilary as well..
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June 3, 2019 at 7:55 pm
Not one bit at all.
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June 3, 2019 at 4:38 pm
The left is testing it’s new conservative voter suppression tools. Looks like they work.
Don’t say you weren’t warned.
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June 3, 2019 at 7:58 pm
It will be finely honed… Looks like WordPress is now starting to cull…Creeping Sharia was dumped from wordpress.
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June 3, 2019 at 10:59 am
Every time I read something like this, and I’m not 100% sure what happened (sorry), I remember what Obama tried to do to conservatives thru his IRS and how nothing happened because of it. Nothing. Lois Lerner quit with full benefits. Nothing happened. They were picking on Conservatives with a ‘sacred’ institution to the people like OUR Internal Revenue Service. Nothing happened.
I guess my feeling is that if that could be virtually ignored, as bad as that was , as highly threatening as that was, what more could government do?
This is nothing Trump would have done. is Obama back in government? Does he emerge every time something like this is discussed, covered with mud as he hurls himself out of the deep, muddy, ugly SWAMP and walks home to Michelle?
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June 3, 2019 at 11:03 am
We will never know what happened…. maybe it was nothing of importance…or some of the old guard just flexing a bit.. It was a good chance to revisit just what Obama had in mind for us. And they accuse Trump of being some right wing dictator type nut?
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June 3, 2019 at 12:06 pm
there was enough that came out which pointed at abuse of Conservative groups/taxes, etc.
But, as always, THE LEFT WINS.
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June 3, 2019 at 9:31 am
I suspect few people realize how pervasive the internet has become in our lives. I never gave much thought to the possibility that government could strong-arm large techno-firms into providing data about our habits, our movements, who we know, what we buy, or how much money we have in our banking accounts. Or, for that matter, how much we owe. Similarly, I never gave much thought to the fact that government could shut it all down with the flip of a switch, either. There is an interesting post at AOW today … somewhat parallels yours (http://alwaysonwatch3.blogspot.com). I think we are past the point of no return.
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June 3, 2019 at 9:45 am
AOW had am interesting post and I commented apparently at the same time as you. The genie is out of the bottle.
I take a bit of a different point of view….setting aside the negatives, technology has made for wonderful advancements.
It reminded me of the Anthropology class argument I had. A hundred people were digging for years to cut a road through and around a mountain. Equipment became available to the Anthropologist who could easily have the work completed in a few months thus freeing up the people. My position was she/he should go for it. The Prof argues that the whole structure and politics of the community would be upended with jobs lost, etc.
So who was right?
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June 3, 2019 at 7:05 pm
Yes, I’ll be interested in the outcome of a lawsuit(s) I noticed against various businesses going or trying to go cashless. That’s a big hitter when cash is no longer legal tender as it says on every bill that it is.
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June 3, 2019 at 9:30 am
So would this be a shot over the bow of Google, Facebook, et al (since they seem to be intent on censoring conservatives while letting Antifa, Al Qaeda, and other groups post freely)?
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June 3, 2019 at 9:47 am
A thought was mentioned that an Anti-trust suit was starting… hmmm… interesting as to how and the what of it. We will ever know that is for sure.
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June 3, 2019 at 12:06 pm
Since the Wall Street Journal wrote about the Dept. of Justice launching an anti-trust investigation into Google, we will see if anything comes of it.
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June 3, 2019 at 9:03 am
This made for a hectic work day.
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June 3, 2019 at 9:05 am
A strange business whatever it was… We forget what Obama had in mind and a chance for a refresher.
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June 3, 2019 at 8:30 am
I noticed this—actually we all did here…weird…never dawned me on what you wrote it could be true.
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June 3, 2019 at 8:39 am
So many swamp creatures left behind after Obama….
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