[Reuters] DHS and GAO Want to Throttle Interwebs If H1N1 Goes Pandemic - Overclock.net

thiussat · 4 Weeks Ago

From Reuters

Full article here

Quote:

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Securities exchanges have a sound network back-up if a severe pandemic keeps people home and clogging the Internet, but the Homeland Security Department has done little planning, Congressional investigators said on Monday.

The department does not even have a plan to start work on the issue, the General Accountability Office said.

But the Homeland Security Department accused the GAO of having unrealistic expectations of how the Internet could be managed if millions began to telework from home at the same time as bored or sick schoolchildren were playing online, sucking up valuable bandwidth.

Experts have for years pointed to the potential problem of Internet access during a severe pandemic, which would be a unique kind of emergency. It would be global, affecting many areas at once, and would last for weeks or months, unlike a disaster such as a hurricane or earthquake.

H1N1 swine flu has been declared a pandemic but is considered a moderate one. Health experts say a worse one -- or a worsening of this one -- could result in 40 percent absentee rates at work and school at any given time and closed offices, transportation links and other gathering places.

Many companies and government offices hope to keep operations going as much as possible with teleworking using the Internet. Among the many problems posed by this idea, however, is the issue of bandwidth -- especially the "last mile" between a user's home and central cable systems.

"Such network congestion could prevent staff from broker-dealers and other securities market participants from teleworking during a pandemic," reads the GAO report, available here

"The Department of Homeland Security is responsible for ensuring that critical telecommunications infrastructure is protected."

Full article here

First Obama wanted the ability to single handedly shut down the tubes during a cyber-attack and now the DHS wants control over how much we can use the Internet if we are all sick and staying home from work/school. Personally I think it is all BS -- I don't think there would be much of a bandwidth shortage even if 40% of citizens were isolated at home during a pandemic. It wouldn't be much different than any regular day between 7-12 P.M.

And why must these people video conference with each other? Can't they use some other less bandwidth intensive protocol like maybe encrypted IM or e-mail? Even the telephone?

EDIT: The author of this article incorrectly refers to DHS as "Homeland Security Department." It should be "Department of Homeland Security." Just a little correction for her.

Brutuz · 4 Weeks Ago

I have (suspected) H1N1 and its made me go on less..

iquark · 4 Weeks Ago

I never thought about the side effects of having a large portion of the population home from work. This is kind of an interesting question, but wouldn't some of the increased home activity be offset by a decrease of business activity?

tNok85 · 4 Weeks Ago

Quote:

Originally Posted by iquark

I never thought about the side effects of having a large portion of the population home from work. This is kind of an interesting question, but wouldn't some of the increased home activity be offset by a decrease of business activity?

No. Most activity caused by *workers* at a business over the Internet is browsing the web or communicating with another location within an extended network. (Two or more sites in one company...)

All that will STILL go on for most people who work from home. However, you're also (usually) connected to a virtual private network, so all the communications are doubled since your business uses bandwidth obtaining it (like usual) then *doubles* it by having to send it to your remote location.

And the question 'why don't people just IM or email' is incredibly misinformed.

I think the root problem lies in that if everybody who has been sold a certain bandwidth decided to use even half of it at once, the networks would come crashing down because the ISPs have oversold their supposed bandwidth to the power of a double digit number.

thiussat · 4 Weeks Ago

Quote:

Originally Posted by tNok85

And the question 'why don't people just IM or email' is incredibly misinformed.

Why? Do these people *really* need bandwidth intensive video conferencing? Perhaps a few executives are important enough for it, but not enough to make a significant dent in nationwide bandwidth.

And if a person is important enough where they must be on a video conference with their office, then they need to have some sort of dedicated T1-T3 line to their home. They should not be using a residential ISP connection for it, or if they do, they shouldn't ***** if it isn't reliable enough.

Most people aren't very important and do not work at overly technical jobs where a high degree of mobility and connectivity is needed. I don't think McDonalds needs to video conference all of its sick employees. Therefore, I am skeptical that the Internet would come to a halt if 40% of America was sick at home.

tNok85 · 4 Weeks Ago

Quote:

Originally Posted by thiussat

Why? Do these people *really* need bandwidth intensive video conferencing? Perhaps a few executives are important enough for it, but not enough to make a significant dent in nationwide bandwidth.

And if a person is important enough where they must be on a video conference with their office, then they need to have some sort of dedicated T1-T3 line to their home. They should not be using a residential ISP connection for it, or if they do, they shouldn't ***** if it isn't reliable enough.

Most people aren't very important and do not work at overly technical jobs where a high degree of mobility and connectivity is needed. I don't think McDonalds needs to video conference all of its sick employees. Therefore, I am skeptical that the Internet would come to a halt if 40% of America was sick at home.

No, as in, video conferencing is NOT very common *at all* for a normal business person who is working at home - if working at home is the exception, not the norm.

What you see in the movies of executives constantly video conferencing around the house is just that - executives, and movies.

Video conferencing is used commonly in several cases with permanent work from home employees. The first main reason is to verify that the employee is working without having to do something more complex like check logs and such. Any manager with no technical training can stare at a wall of screens to see if people are there. (And if somebody is sent home to work at home temporarily, or only occasionally, they often have discretion with their work or have earned it)

The second main reason is pharmaceutical. There are a large number of pharmacists now who work from home filling orders. There are legal issues and such which require cams to be installed and timestamped with logs to verify it is the licensed pharmacist taking care of orders, and not somebody else.

Finally, if you warrant a video conference and are not one of the above, you're either pretty damn important (try to get director or VP to hang out with you just in your cubicle/office for 20 minutes?) or it's a crisis of some kind.

Video conferencing would not add to the load.

Edit: What would add to the load is that most people who work in front of a computer from 9-5 do not go home and spend another 6 hours on the computer. They do other stuff. So it'd be prime time *plus* a reasonable portion of the workforce.

TestECull · 4 Weeks Ago

....great, even more paranoia and madness created by a half-assed "pandemic" that can't even outpace the normal variant.

Coma · 4 Weeks Ago

I like how the problem is supposedly the last mile bandwidth...

nyder · 4 Weeks Ago

Well, if the phone companies had laid the fiber optics like we paid for, and the ISP haven't oversold the amount of users, this probably wouldn't be an issue.

In fact, this is all speculation.

I see it as dumbasses that don't know **** trying to fear monger the peeps.

Urufu_Shinjiro · 4 Weeks Ago

Quote:

Originally Posted by TestECull

....great, even more paranoia and madness created by a half-assed "pandemic" that can't even outpace the normal variant.

QFT! More people have died from the regular flu each year for as long as we've had the damn flu than those that have died from swine flu since it jumped to people!

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[Reuters] DHS and GAO Want to Throttle Interwebs If H1N1 Goes Pandemic

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