In today's edition of "they sky is falling," we pick up on the woeful predictions of one Dr. Hannu Kari, who pinpoints 2006 as the end of the Internet as we know it. Today the good professor warned that the fun bus could all come to a crashing halt in less than two years because of steady increases in everything that makes the Internet such a pain in the rear. Viruses, trojans, spam, and security flaws are all on the march in the view of the Helsinki University of Technology professor, and if current trends continue, their burden will topple the global network. In case you didn't get the memo:
"There are many bad people who want to create chaos on purpose," said Kari
Kari has actually been caught holding the "end is nigh" sign before. It seems that an independent media arm of Finnish business and industry published the missives of the researcher back in 2001, when Kari was giving the 'net 5 years to live. For those of you not doing the math, that means that his slavish dedication to 2006 as the year the 'net goes black has been consistent for a while. After a heart wrenching story of a bakery nearly destroyed by a malicious hacker, Kari got down to baking his own loaf.
?The case of this bakery is a good example that it?s worth investing in data protection before something happens, because otherwise it becomes expensive. On the other hand, you have to remember that technical safeguards won?t solve everything; the most important thing of all for companies is a risk analysis. You must also make a conscious decision about how the company will function if something happens,? he said.
Kari's point is really one already made by Benjamin Franklin: a stitch in time saves nine. (Or is that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure? Gah.) The problem is that Kari has apparently failed to notice that most of his complaints about the Internet are already being addressed, and "stitches" (if you will) for spyware, spam, viruses, and the like are coming or are already in place. Back in 2001, perhaps it was easier to see the annoyances of the Internet as major threats that could easily destroy the network.
?I predict another five years for the Internet in its present form. The reason for this will be that proper users? dissatisfaction will have reached such heights by then that some other system will be needed, unless the Internet is improved and made reliable,? Kari said.
While dissatisfaction and annoyance are important matters, and while we all lament the deluge of spam and spyware, these things do not a cataclysm make. The real question is what this other system would be that Kari thinks will save us from ourselves. The professor pins his hopes on tougher communications security, making the valid point that while you may think a firewall is all you need to keep you safe, the reliability of data in transmit is still a huge issue.
?The only data security that really works is based on publicity. It?s a little like locking a house: if you try to make the locking system as unobtrusive and inconspicuous as possible, somebody will test to see if it works, but if the system appears extremely difficult to break down as soon as you look at it, anyone with evil intentions will probably admit that it?s not even worth trying to break in there,? Kari explains.
?In the same way a hacker must be given a signal that we?re protecting our system so strongly that it?s not worth your while trying to break in. And what?s more, if we notice that you have tried, we?ll swap these machines for even better ones.?
Dr, Kari's views are commonsensical, you could say. Is there a need to dress them up as befitting an apocalyptic prophet? Proboably not. But that doesn't mean there isn't a reason for the dog and pony show. As it turns out, Kari is a business man and a professor, with "background influence" at SSH Communications Security and security company Nixu. He has also worked at Nokia and was a contributing designer to the GPRS standard, and himself holds upwards of a few dozen patents. What's good for the goose?
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