In The News

When Will the West Care About Terrorism in Pakistan?

Aaron David Miller March 29, 2016
European and US media devoted far more coverage to the March 22 terrorist attacks in Brussels than those in Lahore on Easter Sunday. Coverage of attacks anywhere is generally shallow, alarmist and more descriptive than analytical. Aaron David Miller, a vice president at the Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars, criticizes the media and government response in the West by comparing casualty numbers,...

A Flat World Gets Bumpy With Globalization in Retreat

David Dapice March 24, 2016
Uncertainty and instability threaten the global economy, and monetary stimulus by the central banks, including negative rates, is not delivering growth or confidence. So far, the United States is alone in breaking away from the pack to engage in monetary tightening and gradually lifting interest rates. China employs strict controls to prevent businesses and savers from sending cash outside the...

Quietly, Symbolically, US Control of the Internet Just Ended

Maria Farrell March 16, 2016
Governments and Icann, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, reached an agreement to shift control over the internet from the US government to a global group of stakeholders, explains Maria Farrell, former Icann employee, for the Guardian. The organizers will downplay the shift. “When Icann was founded in 1998, the plan was to keep its anchoring contract with the US National...

Inside Facebook’s Ambitious Plan to Connect the Whole World

Jessi Hempel March 2, 2016
Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, views the internet as an essential service. He “believes peer-to-peer communications will be responsible for redistributing global power, making it possible for any individual to access and share information,” writes Jessi Hempel for Wired. “People could tap into government services, determine crop prices, get health care. A kid in India … could...

India’s Regulator Effectively Bans Facebook’s Free Basics Service

Sean McLain, Joanna Sugden and Deepa Seetharaman February 10, 2016
Net neutrality as principle argues that internet service providers should enable access to all content and applications regardless of the source, without favoring or blocking particular websites. “Facebook Inc.’s efforts to expand Internet access in the developing world suffered a blow Monday when India’s telecommunications regulator ruled that the social-media company’s plan to offer free access...

10 Big Technology Trends Likely to Emerge in 2016

Gadgets 360 Staff January 1, 2016
Technology revolutionizes the world, and predicting technology trends can be tricky. NDTV in India gives it a try by identifying 10 trends, warning “surprises can pop up out of anywhere, anytime.” Leading the list is major tech firms pushing online dependency on licensed services, updates, tracking with ongoing subscriptions and fees. Streaming adds bandwidth pressure and increased reliance on...

Cybersecurity Treaties May Be Nice, But It’s Every Country for Itself

Robert Litwak and Meg King November 13, 2015
China and the United States are attempting to negotiate a cyber arms-control agreement. Robert Litwak and Meg King, writing for Reuters, detail the differences between nuclear and cyber arms control. Individuals and non-state actors, even insiders, can pose cybersecurity threats. Also, “authoritarian states, such as Russia and China, have an interest in preserving ‘patriotic hackers’ as a policy...