What if the Internet shut down?

     2020 has taught us to re-adjusting our daily activities in the wake of covid-19 with businesses shutting down grappling services delivery around the globe. The internet was a life-saving tool for everyone last year, bringing families together, keeping businesses afloat and saving lives. It’s only been 31 years since Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web and 30 years since he launched the first server. We have taken tremendous strides in developing how the internet functions. Initially, its purpose was to share information within a minimal time through emails. Now we have social media with many platforms changing communication dynamics.

     In retrospect, forms of communication practised in the past by our predecessors relied on time as a vital factor in delivering and taking action on a message. In the African culture, messages and signals were sent by drums, horns and smoke to communicate, later evolving to messengers who ran distances to deliver messages. At a later stage, birds were used to deliver written messages. The key factor in communication is the authenticity of the message. Conventional authentic verification over the years for quite a long time was by stamping and signing messages. We are currently relying on the internet as an authentic tool for message delivery and doing business.

     It is at this point that the security of our communication can be easily thwarted by online fraudsters and criminals for personal gain. Most big companies have taken the lead in investing in cybersecurity which is the biggest threat to the fall of the internet. The common people will be the ones at the losing end if things go south. It would be almost impossible for the internet to shut down with many backup options in place but never say never. Who thought that we would be locked in our houses for over a year? Other possible causes of a complete Internet shutdown would be if the Internet transmitters in space would be completely destroyed or a catastrophe destroying the Internet infrastructure. We wouldn’t need the internet in a catastrophe either way. We would go back to factory settings in surviving skills. I doubt if the younger generation knows how to find a location without a GPS. Forget about Uber, Netflix or a simple email if the internet goes down. How will we learn to communicate without our phones?

    Social gatherings and family meetings have no sentimental meaning anymore. We have our faces stuck on our phones instead of talking to each other to create bonds. Gone are the days when you knew your neighbour with the entire extended family. I do not know my neighbours nor do they know about me. We have to learn how to adjust ourselves in case of an internet shutdown. The psychological effects of the lack of our daily habits available are more profound than we could imagine.

      Losing the internet would be like going back to the ice age communicating with clicking sounds like the Khoisan tribe of the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa. On a serious note, most businesses are internet reliant on banking institutions, hospitals, military and small businesses that use internet payments. All the social media influencers at the prime of their careers at the moment would be jobless and all online businesses will be shut down. My thoughts and ideas would remain with me with no audience and means to share. We should be thinking of ways to back up in case of such adversity. When marines have a challenge to accomplish, they do not sit and whine, they take take it by the horns and practise the drills required to solve the problem. With such a strategy, getting ready to adjust is the way to go.