Internet Governance or Internet Control?

Controlling the Internet has for a long time been the privilege of academics in the USA. However, with the evolution of the Internet as the world communication medium of the 21st century and the world-wide-web providing the infrastructure for business and public services in the digital era, the stakes have risen dramatically. The value of the Internet is nowadays considered extremely important in a number of key areas of public life ranging from business, law, local and central government to international politics. Various proposals as to who should be responsible for controlling or even policing the Internet have been considered and debated upon over the past few years. The issue has been raised at an unprecedented level with governments of the most powerful countries on the planet locked in serious and longstanding diplomatic negotiations as to which of the super powers should be in control. Yet the less powerful and smaller nations have repeatedly called for the establishment of an international organization to guarantee independent control of the Internet. This paper considers the above two proposals and attempts to answer the following questions: a) Do single countries deserve the right of having absolute control and acting as the sole guardian of the ultimate communication medium? b) Would an international organization be the answer? If so, how independent can it be and how much security can it offer to the smaller nations and the individual user? The study of each case is performed on the basis of what criteria would apply in terms of legal framework adopted, transparency of procedures and degree of acceptance of the controlling body on a world wide basis. The ultimate question raised is: can the guardian be trusted and if so how widespread this trust would be? The results of the first internet governance forum meeting in Athens in 2006 and the aims of the second due in Rio de Janeiro in November 2007 are also discussed

Selected Extended Papers

International audienc

Ecrime threats on Egovernment – the case of Maldives

EGovernment implementations are nowadays common even amongst the smallest and countries around the world. The challenge of building such systems is even greater for developing countries, in particular those who are struggling against considerable penetration of the Digital Divide in their society. This paper proposes a theoretical framework for implementing eGovernment in the Maldives, a small country aiming to overcome the difficulties of offering twentyfirst century services to a small by widely dispersed population. The particular interest in the case of the Maldives is that the technological infrastructure is sensitive and dependent on external condition, while there is wide chasm in society due to the effects of the Digital Divide

E-voting vs. e-trust: A test bed for e-democracy in a world in crisis?

The world is currently experiencing a number of real challenges in the face of persistent economic crisis, local conflicts and huge waves of refugees. All of the above are affecting secure access to, completion of peoples’voting rights and participation in Democratic processes in their homeland.The relevant technological solutions appear to have matured and have successfully responded to rigorous testing. The need for digital access to election events is today higher than ever in the digital age. The question that remains to be answered is whether all this is enough to inspire people to trust the systems and participate in e-voting; particularly in areas where the political climate might be volatile and Trust is a rare commodity. The authors present the outcome of a survey among the Palestinian diaspora to gauge their trust and willingness to use e-voting systems in the Palestinian Authority’s elections. This work does not consider political implications or even the willingness of a specific government to embrace e-voting for conducting election

E-voting versus e-trust: A case for e-democracy in Palestine

The world at present is facing a number of real challenges in the face of persistent economic crisis, local conflicts and huge waves of refugees. All of the above are affecting secure access to and completion of peoples voting rights. The relevant technological solutions appear to have matured and have successfully responded to rigorous testing. The need for digital access to election events is probably higher than ever in digital age. The question that remains to be answered is whether all this enough to inspire people to trust the systems and participate amass in e-voting particularly in areas where the political climate might be volatile. Palestinian have been scattered across the world since the late 1940s. This forced diaspora creates particular challenges as the Palestinian Authority (PA) continues to gain international recognition as an emerging state. The PA is experiencing a huge difficulty in enabling its citizens to elect their representative. According to PA officials many countries who are hosting Palestinians as refugees don’t accept the facilitation of elections for representatives to the PA government. Using e-voting systems could offer a solution to overcoming this problem and the PA has been evaluating such systems since 2011. The inspiration for this paper is taken from the results of an extensive survey conducted by the authors to evaluate the response amongst Palestinians around the world to the Palestinian Authority’s decision to fully embrace e-Voting

Can e-Government applications contribute to performance improvement in public administration?

Electronic Government applications have been the focus of hundreds of local and national government administrations all over the world during the past decade. The emphasis of most of these applications lies in their effort to improve the experience of the user in interacting with public administration services and to minimise waiting times in completing transactions public services and citizens. Early applications were relying mainly on the speed and simplicity of submitting a request by the user while most of the work beyond the web based interaction was carried out as in the era before the introduction of the web based applications. The benefits from such endeavours have been short lived as citizens are looking for real enhancements in the way public administration serves their needs and responds to their requests. The authors argue that for e-government applications to succeed, considerable changes in the way public administration organizes itself and how it utilizes information management systems to respond to user / citizen requirements including and addressing the goals of all stakeholders involved are required. Currently the number of successful applications to that end is quite low when compared to the projects implemented and the resources invested in such systems so far. The authors propose steps that would maintain the focus of future implementations in doing so. They also identify the next steps for research in addressing this complex and ever evolving issue

Computer Anti-forensics Methods and their Impact on Computer Forensic Investigation

Electronic crime is very difficult to investigate and prosecute, mainly due to the fact that investigators have to build their cases based on artefacts left on computer systems. Nowadays, computer criminals are aware of computer forensics methods and techniques and try to use countermeasure techniques to efficiently impede the investigation processes. In many cases investigation with such countermeasure techniques in place appears to be too expensive, or too time consuming to carry out. Often a case can end up being abandoned and investigators are left with a sense of personal defeat. The methodologies used against the computer forensics processes are collectively called Anti-Forensics. This paper explores the anti forensics problem in various stages of computer forensic investigation from both a theoretical and practical point of view

Web services security evaluation considerations

Web services development is a key theme in utilisation of the commercial exploitation of the semantic web. Paramount to the development and offering of such services is the issue of security features and the way these are applied in instituting trust amongst participants and recipients of the service. Implementing such security features is a major challenge to developers as they need to balance these with performance and interoperability requirements. Being able to evaluate the level of security offered is a desirable feature for any prospective participant. The authors attempt to address the issues of security requirements and evaluation criteria, while they discuss the challenges of security implementation through a simple web service application case

Web services for rural areas—Security challenges in development and use

Web services (WS) are the modern response of traders and online service providers to satisfying the increasing needs and demands of the digital communities. WS formation and operation is based on a software system designed to support interoperable machine-to-machine interaction over a network. Security is of paramount importance to WS and the ability to measure and evaluate the level of security available is key to establishing and continuing to develop the level of trust based on reputation developed by the provider of the WS. The greatest challenge in offering secure WS is to groups of people where the level of expertise of the user is low and the need for transparency of the service provision quite high, such as the case with services offered primarily to people in rural areas. Providers of such services face many challenges in balancing the requirements for performance, interoperability, and security against the cost of implementing secure systems and running profitable operations through low income generating WS. A review of services offered, of the users and the challenges in building online trust among providers and users are discussed for the case of rural areas in the United Kingdom