What if the Internet stopped working as you’ve come to expect it?
Consider just 2 scenarios:
- The effect of everyone working from home over highly contended broadband connections brings the UK internet infrastructure to a grinding halt. Technical controls are enabled and bandwidth-per-customer is capped and rationed by emergency law.
- In response to a mass outbreak of panic, the government, under emergency measures, cuts the cord, or just prevents access to WhatsApp, Faceberg and Twatter.
Now project forward, based on my last post and consider how, once they’ve had a taste, they’ll never kick the habit.
If you’re reliant on cloud services, you will be screwed. For TV, movies, music, books and gaming. For backup & recovery, for your office applications, for your CRM system, your helpdesk toolset, your management of finances, supply chain and mobile workforces.
At the very least you’ll be glad that you hung on to several terabytes of TV, movies, music and literature, and kept all your books, games, CDs and DVDs.
You did do that didn’t you? Or are you living in a pod, completely dependent on outside services that could stop at any time for any number of reasons?
The latest era of centralisation of power and of computing could just be coming to an end. The distributed model is far more resistant to shocks and exigencies.
AJ
Al Jahom's Final Word 
The maintenance crews will also be staying at home, so we can expect a slow degradation of web services and connections. Then the utility technicians might be self-isolating, so energy and water supplies could be disrupted. (So loss of internet won’t matter when you have no electricity.) SNAFU
True enough… I wonder, though, if broadband qualifies as critical national infrastructure in the same way power and water do. I’d be surprised if it did.