Re: Russian government’s disconnection test

[Christopher Morrow <morrowc.lists () gmail com>]

I think the disconnect idea is actually a good one... I don't know
that I want to DO IT, but :) it certainly seems like a reasonable
disaster recovery planning exercise :) (likely doing it is the only
way to really suss out the problems though)

On Sat, Nov 2, 2019 at 12:19 PM Mike Bolitho <mikebolitho () gmail com> wrote:
> > I would imagine that the internet is a whole less resilient today in 2019 than it was back in the day before the 
> > cloud takeover.
>
>
> It's far more resilient now than it has ever been. More sub-sea cables. Multiple routes across continents. The very 
> fact that there are AWS/Azure/Google Cloud data centers located around the globe makes anything hosted there even 
> more resilient, not less (and for the most part, I still prefer on prem DC so I'm not even pushing "To the cloud!").

"as long as the customers (who need global reachability) build their
cloud applications/etc without just sticking everything in the
equivalent of us-east" :)

There are a  LOT of folk who ' tossed it in the cloud, all good now?'
and .. .sadly did not plan on disaster/global-reachability very well
:(

> - Mike Bolitho
>
>
> On Fri, Nov 1, 2019 at 5:16 PM Constantine A. Murenin <mureninc () gmail com> wrote:
> > Unpopular opinion:  other countries should do the same.
> >
> > If somehow all the transatlantic (and/or transpacific) cables are offline; will the whole internet outside of the US 
> > stop working, too?
> >
> > AWS and all the other providers have DCs all over the world, but would they still work if they can't contact the 
> > mothership, and for how long?  (Has any of this ever been tested?)
> >
> > I would imagine that the internet is a whole less resilient today in 2019 than it was back in the day before the 
> > cloud takeover.  You often can't even install OSS without an internet connection anymore.  Would Golang stop 
> > working?  What else?
> >
> > Would you and/or your corporation be able to access your own email?  All these things may seem silly, until you 
> > actually encounter the situation where you're offline, and it's too late to do anything.
> >
> > C.
> >
> > On Fri, 1 Nov 2019 at 18:04, Scott Weeks <surfer () mauigateway com> wrote:
> > > --- surfer () mauigateway com wrote:
> > > From: "Scott Weeks" <surfer () mauigateway com>
> > >
> > > Anyone got any technical info on how Russia plans to execute
> > > a disconnection test of the internet?
> > > ------------------------------------
> > >
> > >
> > > Got crickets, so now I have to respond to my own post on
> > > what I just found out about it.  Is that like talking to
> > > yourself? :)
> > >
> > > https://www.npr.org/2019/11/01/775366588/russian-law-takes-effect-that-gives-government-sweeping-power-over-internet
> > >
> > > "The "sovereign Internet law," as the government calls it,
> > > greatly enhances the Kremlin's control over the Web. It was
> > > passed earlier this year and allows Russia's government to
> > > cut off the Internet completely or from traffic outside
> > > Russia "in an emergency," as the BBC reported. But some of
> > > the applications could be more subtle, like the ability to
> > > block a single post."
> > >
> > > "The equipment would conduct what's known as "deep packet
> > > inspection," an advanced way to filter network traffic.
> > >
> > > "Regardless of what the government intends, some experts
> > > think it would be technically difficult for Russia to
> > > actually close its network if it wanted to, because of the
> > > sheer number of its international connections."
> > >
> > > "What I found was that there were hundreds of existing
> > > Internet exchange points in Russia, some of which have
> > > hundreds of participants...Many of them are international
> > > network providers, he says, so "basically it's challenging
> > > — if not impossible, I think — to completely isolate the
> > > Russian Internet."
> > >
> > > Belson says that the requirement for Internet service
> > > providers to install tracking software will very likely
> > > also be challenging in practice. He adds that it will be
> > > difficult to get hundreds of providers to deploy it and
> > > hard to coordinate that they're all filtering the same
> > > content.
> > >
> > > scott