British CEO gets “key to the Internet”

Paul Kane, the CEO of UK based firm CommunityDNS, has been given what has been dubbed one of the “keys to the Internet”.

There have been seven keys sent out to trusted holders across the world, all of which can be used together (in a secure location in the US) to “reboot” the Internet after some sort of major disaster or terrorist attack, some reports have suggested.

Yes, it sounds like something out of a high-tech Hollywood blockbuster, but as the Guardian discovered when they talked to Kane about the reality of the situation, it isn’t quite as glamorous as at first glance.

Of course, the whole Internet can’t be “rebooted” by them, as the keys are actually related to the DNSSEC security system, which Kane has been involved in working on.

The emergency keys would actually only restart sites using DNSSEC, a small proportion of the whole net, which would be largely unaffected by the whole thing.

When asked by the Guardian whether there would ever be one “master key” for the Internet, Kane replied: “Never. Even if there was such a key, it would trigger the balkanisation of the Internet. The EU wouldn’t want the US to have it, the Middle East wouldn’t want the EU to have it, the US wouldn’t want anyone to have it.”

A fair point. We’d just have to give it to the penguins in the Antarctic to look after.