REHEARSALS OF CHAOS

In the midnight of October 4, European time, the world faced a demo version of the digital apocalypse. Shocked users all over the world watched the silence of many social networks, instant messengers and Internet services, primarily Facebook and its associated services Instagram and WhatsApp. Problems also affected dozens of other popular websites and services, as reported by TikTok, Gmail, YouTube, Netflix, Snapchat, Tinder, etc. Various telecom operators, airlines, and banks, such as Bank of America, also faced problems.

It all started with Facebook, which currently has 2.8 billion users worldwide. As reported later, the global outage was due to “configuration changes in the backbone routers responsible for coordinating network traffic between data centres”. Both Zuckerberg and the American special services immediately rejected a hacker attack. Only six hours later, Facebook employees were able to physically get into the data centres (their electronic passes did not work due to the shutdown of the company's internal services), update the routers and return everything to normal. At the same time, failure in Facebook ricocheted to other companies associated with the company, hence escalating the scale of the problem. The incident has demonstrated to the whole world the obvious things about the world wide web. However, even though we know something about the Internet, experiencing what we know in practice is a completely different thing.

Five factors

First and foremost, everyone realised that the Internet was really a network of interconnected chain of links, which is prone to serious problems if any one of these links breaks. What we saw was not only the failure of Facebook, but also of all the services and applications of companies, which require authorisation through Facebook. In recent years, the digital giant has taken over a lot of such companies. Then those users who lost access to Facebook services rushed to look for alternative sites, which caused breakdowns too because of the overload.

Secondly, it turned out that the Internet can go south due to unforeseen circumstances, and even a human factor, like Facebook administrators making mistakes and billions of people around the world suffering from these mistakes. Experts believe that one of the related factors was the reduction of the staff of engineers at data centres due to the pandemic. But the most unpleasant thing is that the same incident can happen again. A few days after the global network blackout, users complained about problems with accessing the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. On October 8-9, Downdetector specialised in monitoring the stability of the Internet services recorded failures in the operation of WhatsApp, Instagram, and other Facebook services.

Thirdly, after the incident, it became clear that, perhaps, discussions about the transition to a new digital reality known as the Internet of Things (IoT) are premature. Due to the failure of Facebook many people lost access to their accounts in stores, training centres, courier services, could not control TV sets or even the heating appliances tied to online smart home systems. Needless to say, even a group of engineers trying to restart the servers had to use a grinder to get to the technical rooms, as there was simply no other way to unlock the electronic locks. This means that in critical situations, good ol’ mechanical tools of the ‘old world’ are more reliable, albeit less comfortable.

Fourthly, Facebook and its services have long ceased to be just a social network. This is not just a virtual space for communication and distribution of photographs. It has become a huge platform for shaping public opinion and is also a huge business platform. Nowadays, the jobs and businesses of many people are either directly connected to social networks or heavily depend on them. This should show us how dangerous a network monopoly is.

And finally, the international community will no longer be able to postpone the problem of security in the Internet, like the problem of climate change. After all, a sudden halt in the operation of the global network means a collapse of the global economy, transportation, energy supply, etc., which will ultimately lead to a shortage of food, cause famine, social and political upheavals. Since a stable operation of everything and everyone depends on a stable operating network, everyone will suffer – from government agencies and large companies to each individual. For example, the recent Facebook crash caused a fall in stock markets: the Nasdaq Composite Index of high-tech companies fell 2.2% in a few hours, while Dow Jones and S&P 500 lost more than a percent. Facebook shares itself fell more than 5%. According to Forbes, Facebook lost more than $6 billion overnight. Together with Facebook, shares of other IT giants fell in price as well: Twitter lost 6.7% in price, Google - 3%, and Amazon - 2.8%.

Therefore, everyone is already talking about the need to regulate IT giants. The question is where to start in this situation and how to differentiate between the victims and instigators. Indeed, according to one version, the American (perhaps not only American) authorities are trying to take social networks under full control.

United States of Facebook

Here are just a few statements about the recent incident from people directly involved in big politics. “If Facebook’s claims for monopoly were under control, people using Instagram and WhatsApp would not have problems now. It is necessary to break the company into parts,” one of the leaders of the socialist wing of the US Democratic Party, Alessandra Ocasio-Cortez, said. German Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection Christine Lambrecht said that it was necessary to tighten the rules for regulating the activities of Facebook. She also underlined the social importance of large technology corporations, noting that calls for self-regulation do not work any more.

Mark Zuckerberg’s face was on the cover of the last issue of The Time, while the Twitter acounted of the magazine asked the readers make a choice – to delete their Facebook accounts or not. Edward Snowden twitted that due to the Internet outage the world became healthier for at least a few hours and suggested thinking about creating some alternative communication channels. Sheera Frenkel, co-author of An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook's Battle for Domination, mentions that “Facebook is not even a political party, but it has long been more powerful than the President of the United States.”

There have been many scandals around Facebook recently related to the leakage of user data, publication of disinformation and content provoking violence, hatred, manipulation of the US elections in 2016 and during the British referendum on leaving the European Union. In other words, there is an obvious threat to the democratic values of the Western society.

Just before the failure, in her interview to CBS, former Facebook employee Frances Haugen revealed many internal company documents, noting that her management knows that some content on the social network may be dangerous for the psyche of their users, especially teenagers, but ignores or even hides it all for financial gain. Also, Privacy Affairs reported that at one of the hacker forums, unknown persons put up for sale data with personal information of more than 1.5 billion Facebook users, which can be used for different types of online fraud. The Wall Street Journal wrote about a large-scale study in the US, which revealed a negative impact of Instagram on teens. Again it is emphasised that the management is aware of this, but continues to publicly ignore the problems.

Anyway, the Facebook accident can be compared to the recent (March 2021) incident in the Suez Canal, which was blocked by the container ship Ever Given. After this demo version of the digital apocalypse, the world started more intense discussions about the urgency to support and develop national platforms and social networks. Spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, once again mentioned that it was necessary to develop Russia’s own segment of information and communication technologies.

So, can we say that the ongoing events demonstrate a global division of the Internet and a completely new configuration of virtual reality? Or maybe we eye-witness Facebook's slow funeral ceremony? Facebook is still very popular, but it gradually loses ground to TikTok. Nevertheless, this intrigue does not change the global question of the security of the world wide web.