Year: 2024
Type: conference-paper
Abstract: The deepening process of fragmentation has become a new challenge for the unity, security, and stable development of the global Internet. That is, it can be said that the Internet is in danger of disintegrating into separate fragments that are weakly connected. Several disturbing trends related to the technological development of the Internet, the Internet policies and commercial activities of individual countries, as well as the current international situation, are called the causes of fragmentation. The process of fragmentation has put the global Internet space in front of a new threat, which is also related to the establishment of total control over it by individual autocratic governments, global ethno-conflicts, and hostilities, as well as increased cybercrimes. All this violates the unity and stability of the Internet and threatens its stable and safe development process. This process also contradicts the Tunisian Agenda adopted by the United Nations Assembly in 2005. Internet fragmentation is a new process and it is a subject of extensive research. This paper briefly reviews the technical, commercial, and governmental forms of Internet fragmentation, and at the same time, focuses on the political aspect of fragmentation. It is the Internet policies and approaches of individual countries that are considered the political part of fragmentation, and in many cases, political fragmentation has an impact on the other three forms of fragmentation. The fact that such global organizations as ICANN and RIPE NCC still manage to maintain an independent position and not turn the issue into a political one deserves attention here because the politicization of the technical management of the Internet represents the danger that may follow the irreversible process of Internet fragmentation. The paper also offers the mathematical model of internet fragmentation. The model can be modified based on the geopolitical landscape and the responses of nations over time.
Authors: Vladimer Svanadze, Maksim Iavich
Institution: Caucasus University
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W7166301879