Dubai: Internet connectedness and the world order will face many significant challenges, an industry expert said.
“In the next few years, the internet will totally change and it will be inter-connected,” Professor Philip N. Howard, Professor of Department of Communication at University of Washington and Professor of Central European University, Hungary.
He said about 75 billion apps have been downloaded so far with an average of 38 apps on each phone and about two billion smartphones globally.
By 2016, eight billion people and eight billion devices will be connected to the internet but by 2020, there will be nine billion people and 30 billion connected devices.
“There will be many significant political changes for internet connectedness and the world order to the internet of things. There are three scenarios based on separate assumptions which institutions and organizations may lead and dominate the development of new norms, practices and patterns of behaviour among both political actors and technology users,” he said.
He said the scenario for market-led growth is which technology and media firms dominate globalisation and negotiate between the interests of technology consumers and government clients while a government-led scenario is re-instated by the standard-setting process and the development of new technologies.
The third scenario is where civil society actors are given “significant influence” over how the world comes to be connected, what terms of services can be, and what government regulators are tasked to do.
If the current trends persist, the most likely outcome for the 2015-2020 timeframe is a state-controlled internet in which interconnectedness by definition involves extensive surveillance and regional technology blocs while “internet freedoms” appear only in the countries that have the civil society actors to lobby for such freedoms.
What makes the internet governance so contested is the robust growth of new users and the piece of technological innovation.
