InternetServiceReviews.com

On June 19, 2010, Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT) introduced a bill called “Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act of 2010″,[4] which he co-wrote with Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) and Senator Thomas Carper (D-DE). If signed into law, this controversial bill, which the American media dubbed the Kill switch bill, would grant the President emergency powers over the Internet. Other parts of the bill focus on the establishment of an Office of Cyberspace Policy and on its missions, as well as on the coordination of cyberspace policy at the federal level. Interviewed by Candy Crowley on CNN’s State of the Union, Lieberman claimed that “a cyber attack on America [could] do as much or more damage [...] by incapacitating our banks, our communications, our finance, our transportation, as a conventional war attack”.[5] If national security were to be severely threatened by a cyber attack, broadband providers, search engines, software firms and other major players in the Telecommunications/Computer/Internet industry could be required to immediately comply and implement any emergency measure taken;[6] for most of the month of June, media coverage of the bill insisted on this so-called ‘Kill switch’ provision, said to be included in the bill.[7] However, after this proposal became controversial, in large part due to concerns that it granted too much power to the President and threatened freedom of speech, all three co-authors of the bill issued a statement claiming that instead, the …