Google Ideas Boss's Really Bad Idea: Kick ISIS Off The Open Web

Over the last few weeks, there's been increasing focus on what "else" Silicon Valley can do in the fight against ISIS. Backdooring encryption is a dumb idea that won't work and will make everyone less safe. So, a second idea keeps getting floated: what if we just stopped letting ISIS use the internet. Hell, both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump supported the idea recently. And then you have some wacky law professors suggesting the same thing.

For the most part, cooler heads in the tech industry have pointed out that (1) this is impossible and (2) any attempt to do so would be counterproductive in just encouraging more activity and (3) it would actually undermine intelligence gathering, as public posts to social media are a key source of useful intelligence these days.

But, now, at least one prominent person within the tech industry has jumped on board: the somewhat controversial head of Google Ideas, Jared Cohen, who used to work for the State Department and now runs Google Ideas (which, for whatever it's worth, isn't "Google"). Cohen gave a talk in the UK in which he argued that ISIS was too good at propaganda on the internet, so the answer is to wipe them off the open internet and leave them shuffling around the dark web instead.

Jared Cohen, the director of Google Ideas, believes that to "recapture digital territory" from the terror cell, its members must fear being caught when they post messages promoting the organisation's cause in public.

"Terrorist groups like Isis, they operate in the dark web whether we want them to or not," Cohen said at a talk on Waging a Digital Counterinsurgency, at Chatham House. "What is new is that they're operating without being pushed back in the same internet we all enjoyed. So success looks like Isis being contained to the dark web".

This is, as noted above, both silly and wrong. First of all, it's impossible. It's a ridiculous task that will waste a ton of time, won't accomplish anything really useful, and will likely result in too many false positives, including (most likely) those who are monitoring and combating ISIS. Second, as mentioned, it will actually do a tremendous amount to limit the intelligence community's ability to monitor and track ISIS. It's funny that on the one hand we have officials demanding an end to encrypted communications, fearing "going dark," while many of those same individuals then turn around and talk about taking ISIS off the public internet, where they reveal a ton of useful information about their activities. Third, it raises serious questions about how committed companies like Google really are to the open internet. Yes, Cohen is director of "Google Ideas" which is separate from Google itself, but basically all of the press coverage about this says that Google is saying people should be kicked off the open web. That's messaging that will come back to haunt Google as it pushes for the open web in other contexts. Cohen has just opened up Google to a major attack on key points it's pushing for everywhere else.

On top of that, Cohen seems to think that losing their Twitter accounts will be seen as some kind of punishment:

To do this Cohen said that Isis members openly promoting their cause online must fear retribution and being caught for their actions. Their social media accounts must be removed as fast as they are produced to prevent people making contact with Isis recruiters on the open web.

But that appears to be somewhat ignorant of how things are currently working. Many of their social media accounts are being removed rapidly and to ISIS supporters it becomes a badge of honor, as they quickly open a new account. It's not retribution, it becomes validation.

It's too bad that Cohen would suggest such a short-sighted concept when there's so much evidence these days of how completely counterproductive it would be. This isn't the kind of creative or new thinking that was promised from Google Ideas, it's traditional silly Washington DC thinking, without any recognition of the reality of the technology world. If this is a concept from Google Ideas, let's just say it's a really, really bad idea. Maybe Google needs a department of better ideas.

Update: And I missed the biggest laugh of all. I hadn't even realized that the supposed "mission" of Google Ideas is: "Google Ideas builds products to support free expression and access to information for people who need it most." Hard to see how blocking people from using the internet fits within that purview.

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