Darknet


Geopolitics and Uses


Volume 2 – Computing and Connected Society SET Coordinated by Dominique Carré and Geneviève Vidal

Darknet

Laurent Gayard, Institut Catholique de Paris, France


ISBN : 9781786302021

Publication Date : April 2018

Hardcover 196 pp

120.00 USD

Co-publisher

Description


The phenomenon of the darknet has aroused fascination and concern and is still badly misunderstood. “Hidden Internet”, “deep web”, “darknets”… these terms actually indicate very different realities to those they are often confused with.

From the birth of hacking and the development of illegal file sharing, up until the creation of true parallel networks that are made up of Tor, I2P or Freenet, darknets have been a computer phenomenon. Now, it is perhaps becoming a social phenomenon. Since Facebook and Twitter have already entered Tor, cryptoanarchists, activists and whistleblowers rub shoulders with hackers and online drug dealers on hidden networks that are slowly becoming accessible to the general public.

This book traces the history of the creation and development of these parallel networks (to which we refer under the loose term “darknet”) and analyzes their geopolitical, economic and sociocultural implications in terms of cybersecurity, the preservation of individual freedoms and the global governance of the Internet.

Contents


Part 1. New Frontiers and Governance of Digital Space
1. Fragmentation and Compartmentalization of Virtual Space.
2. A Society of Control and Panopticism.
3. The Internet, a Governance Subject to Controversy.

Part 2. Crypto-Anarchism, Cryptography and Hidden Networks
4. From the ARPANET to the Darknet: When States Lose Cryptographic Warfare.
5. From Sneaker Nets to Darknets.
6. Geopolitics and Cybersecurity.

About the authors/editors


Laurent Gayard teaches history and political sciences at high school and at the Institut Catholique de Paris in France. He is the author of two previous books.