Reset: Reclaiming the Internet for Civil Society

by Ronald J. Deibert Narrated by Ronald J. Deibert

Overview

In the 2020 CBC Massey Lectures, bestselling author and renowned technology and security expert Ronald J. Deibert exposes the disturbing influence and impact of the internet on politics, the economy, the environment, and humanity.

Digital technologies have given rise to a new machine-based civilization that is increasingly linked to a growing number of social and political maladies. Accountability is weak and insecurity is endemic, creating disturbing opportunities for exploitation.?

Drawing from the cutting-edge research of the Citizen Lab, the world-renowned digital security research group which he founded and directs, Ronald J. Deibert exposes the impacts of this communications ecosystem on civil society. He tracks a mostly unregulated surveillance industry, innovations in technologies of remote control, superpower policing practices, dark PR firms, and highly profitable hack-for-hire services feeding off rivers of poorly secured personal data. Deibert also unearths how dependence on social media and its expanding universe of consumer electronics creates immense pressure on the natural environment.?In order to combat authoritarian practices, environmental degradation, and rampant electronic consumerism, he urges restraints on tech platforms and governments to reclaim the internet for civil society.

Editorial Reviews

Financial Times

Acute and provocative.

Quill & Quire

Reset is a shocking call to action and a persuasively argued book. It is the sort of text one hopes will be read widely … After all, a reset of the basic infrastructure of life will only come through a profound political reckoning — and like the foment of 1968, it may just be a reconceptualization of what we want and why we want it that finally drives change.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940175127868
Publisher:	House of Anansi Press Inc
Publication date:	10/05/2021
Series:	The CBC Massey Lectures
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER OUTLINE:

Chapter One: Social Media Is Surveillance Capitalism. The economic model of social media is organized around personal data surveillance.

Chapter Two: Social Media Are Addiction Machines. The science of targeted advertising and the “engineering of consent” at the heart of social media.

Chapter Three: Social Media Propels Authoritarian Practices. The rise and spread of authoritarian practices worldwide.

Chapter Four: Social Media Is Environmentally Destructive. The negative environmental impacts associated with social media, from electronic mining to energy consumption to cloud computing’s contributions to CO2 emissions (which now exceeds that of the airline industry) to the growing problem of electronic waste.

Chapter Five: What Is to Be Done? A comprehensive strategy of long-term reform is required, extending from the personal to the political, from the local to the global. We need to imagine a better world and start making it happen before it is too late.

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