Article by Scott Malcomson, foreignaffairs.com , November 14, 2019

In late October, Germany and China launched the commercial-level unveiling of 5G to the public, the wireless technology infrastructure that is transforming the way people use computers. Machines and people will talk to each other over the borderless network we call the Internet. But with 5G, a new networking infrastructure emerges, dependent on the Internet but separate from it and subject to much more government and private control.

With 5G it can run huge amounts of computing at very high speeds without having to plug the input device – a cell phone, for example, or a motor vehicle – into a cable of any kind. But these high speeds are only possible if the rest of the system (signal towers, base stations, distributed servers, and large-scale [ megascale ] centers that host data and do much of the computing alone) is with naturally close enough to these input devices. To have the phone, car or your pacemaker in constant contact with the immense computing power in so-called “cloud” sounds amazingly liberating and extraterrestrial . However, by its nature and focus on location, the pop-up system is more grounded than the Internet has ever been.

Whether 5G control will be exercised primarily by states or companies remains to be seen. But the consequences for oversight, security and national prosperity are enormous, and yet policymakers and business executives have just begun to deal with them.

IN THE CLOUD

The Internet has proved extremely resilient to state government. Its use can of course be shaped by costly government initiatives such as China’s Great Firewall or the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation [2] . However, multilateral Internet control efforts have so far failed, mainly because the deliberately impenetrable “global Internet community” – including Internet service providers and sui generis governing institutions such as the Internet Engineering Task Force and the Internet Society – is concerned. , in the best sense of the computer, to avoid being invaded by the state. This attitude may change, but for the time being, the community-mindedness and insecurity of the states, which have held global Internet governance negotiations uniquely counterproductive for years, are combined to keep the Internet an open global platform.

The Internet, of course, is just moving data; it is not storing it. This is done by the servers in the data centers . But even in the world of physical servers, location is less and less important – at least, until the advent of 5G. Check out Amazon Web Services (AWS), the leading data storage company today. The Amazon created the subsidiary was in 2006 in order to put into use in inert space at server of which was made for the peaks in sales in the celebrations. The idea of ​​AWS was to connect this [available] server space to a single ” virtual ” machine, available for rent anywhere at any time. The actual machines involved could be anywhere, distributed (or not) around the world.

As AWS refined its product, this type of computing – soon known as ” cloud computing ” – has become very popular with business owners who are eager to reduce their budgets for IT departments, servers, software. , updates, patches, and then even more servers. You could save the sites you and your data entirely in the “cloud» ( cloud ) and access it directly from a portable computer that uses the Internet. AWS soon became – and remains today – Amazon ‘s only major profit unit .

This cost-effective model proved to be a gift for innovation. The Instagram , with 13 employees, managed to save about 100 million images in the cloud . The Lyft , the Pinterest and Slack [3] all based on cloud computing to build their companies. And as soon as the phones could go, through applications like Instagram , to the cloud and back, they became extensions of huge computing and storage capacity. In fact, not only could you save your data, but you could also do your cloud computing : Services that would otherwise have been purchased as software and stored on dedicated servers were now running remotely.

The Google and as Microsoft, and then the giant Chinese e-commerce and technology Alibaba , launched their own cloud projects to compete with the AWS Amazon . By 2011, large companies were “migrating to the cloud “. With a landmark vote of confidence, the CIA decided to do the same (with AWS) in 2013. The US Department of Defense’s decision last month to fully integrate with cloud computing (using Azure , Microsoft’s response to AWS) marks the maturity of this model. The efficiency, surplus, and security of cloud computing , as well as its ability to encourage – and adapt to – technological innovations, are remarkable. Last year, the value of the cloud computing industry was over $ 200 billion [4].

BACK TO EARTH

So far [all this is happening] without borders; but the physical space still matters. A movie can be stored in the cloud, but the closer the WiFi router is to the laptop on which it is played, the faster the movie ‘s “download” stream . The speed at which a signal moves to and from the computer is characterized by ‘ latency ‘, and the lower the latency , the faster the computing . Even with fiber optic cable, there are advantages latency due to physical proximity (see. The Flash book Boys of Michael Lewis [5]). With radio signals , such as from a mobile phone, latency is much more important because radio waves transmit much less information, at slower speeds, and with more interference than is the case with cables.

If proximity still matters for cloud computing , it’s essential for 5G networks. The magic of 5G is its ability to connect within a millisecond a mobile phone or car or locomotive equipped with a cloud- based sensor that can process data, combine it with other data and return it to the final device . For the process to run smoothly, the latency must remain low. This is the main reason why computing returns to Earth.

Huge sums of money moving to very remote data centers indicate the same. Argentina [6] last month called on AWS to invest $ 800 million in a data center in Buenos Aires. The Google will invest $ 850 million in a new facility in Taiwan [7]. The fact that these companies and their two main competitors, Microsoft and Alibaba , are willing to invest on this scale shows that they recognize that neither the laws on locally installed data (which require citizens to store data in their country) nor will the underlying principles of data sovereignty (the concept, mainly related to China, that cyberspace should be a national territory) disappear anytime soon. But creating data centers is also a way to gain market share by reducing latency for users. The new centers are creating what are called ” availability zones “, where radio wave-based calculations can be performed at even higher speeds. If cloud computing applications are global, then the availability zones are like local clouds , built to meet the needs of latency companies that are increasingly in demand from cloud providers – and in particular latency needs for everything communicates with computers via radio waves, which are many, including cell phones, standalone sensors, and countless wireless sensors out there on the Internet of Things .

If the big multinationals do not control this territory, others will. There is a parallel world of (mostly) smaller and lesser known companies building data centers around the world. The Google and AWS leading the market, but are followed by Digital Realty Trust and Equinix , none of which is not a household name. China, as might be expected, favors domestic cloud data centers , although US companies are often involved [8]. Much of the development of data centers in India and Africa has been driven by smaller companies, often in collaboration with global players [9]. Basic technology is reasonably accessible , although it is expensive to manufacture and cool. (AWS obtained an energy tax exemption for its work in Argentina). The business of data centers is well established, but it is still quite open to search engines or social networking, for example.

RETURN THE CLOUDS

The combination of 5G’s need for low latency and competition in the data center industry indicates the likelihood of more local clouds emerging as the new network is deployed on land. But industry giants have defended the idea defensively because it threatens their ability to cross borders and develop services for the widest possible market. Last month, France and Germany announced plans [10] to build a “European cloud ” that would give local businesses a preference for AWS, Alibaba , Google and other multinational cloud providers . An AWS spokesman responded that such a plan would be scalable to compete with the dominant players in the industry. “We believe the idea of ​​a” national ” cloud is interesting in theory,” said an Amazon spokesman [11], “but it actually removes many of the fundamental benefits of cloud computing .” Microsoft was more brazen, striking Europe’s sensitive point: “Real sovereignty requires the most powerful cloud solutions – otherwise Europe will just consolidate its digital divide.”

However, multinationals, even market leaders, do not always thrive on asserting the sovereignty of governments. Maybe someday the Google search engine will be allowed to come back to China˙ but again, maybe not. Facebook has unfortunately gone off in India in 2016 after a board member, tech legend Marc Andreessen , was hit by a small subcontinent’s resistance and wrote [12]: ” Anti- colonialism has been economically disastrous for the Indian people for decades. . Why stop now? “. The EU GDPR and a host of antitrust fines imposed by the European bloc against Google and Facebook have been essentially greetings in a public-private battle for data control. Russia is implementing legislation aimed at destroying multinational technology companies, although it welcomes the Chinese telecommunications company Huawei as a political- economic alternative to Western platforms. The administration of US President Donald Trump has not yet turned his attention to these issues, but has shown a willingness to attack the technology sector when he considers government privileges to be infringed.

The cloud-computing , the data-centers and industries 5G -to truly become a single industry-must start to think about the future. Currently, AWS, Google Cloud , Microsoft Azure and Alibaba Cloud provide their own separate cloud products . Switching between or combining more than one service is not exactly easy: They are competing companies that want to lock customers and exclude their competitors. But if the new global network built by these companies still needs to be truly global, the products designed for it must be able to move smoothly across these corporate boundaries. Otherwise, cars and phones and the complex processes of the Internet of Things will not be scalable worldwide: At some point in their supposed ethereal progress on the surface of the earth, they will cease to count. In fact, they will need corporate visas to cross the corporate borders. This amounts to a redistribution of state sovereignty to the corporation so extensive that states will react – as they already do. Opposing big tech companies is not a fault. What the Trump administration at Huawei and China once did at Google is what the EU can do for AWS. Silicon Valley ‘s ‘tomorrow belongs to us’ period is over.

At the same time, governments want to be on the best networks, all of which are private. About 50 companies that make up the core of the industry must find ways to align their operational needs with the security and non-monopolistic competition that most governments want. If they do not, the Member may be waging a long war against deterioration of global platforms datacenter-cloud-5G, charging fines by imposing regulations, protecting domestic markets, eliminating foreign competitors, subsidizing national champions etc. The disruption this would cause in today’s networked societies is enormous. Without a more coordinated effort by the corporate forces of the new network, the reactions of the states will become increasingly unpredictable as they deal with their real and perceived vulnerabilities.

The author is Principal at Strategic Insight Group and Future Map. He has released the book Splinternet: How Geopolitics and Commerce Are Fragmenting the World Wide Web (OR Books – ISBN 9781682190319)
Copyright © 2019 by the Council on Foreign Relations, Inc.
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Links :
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Splinternet-Geopolitics-Commerce-Fragmenting-Worl…
[2] https://www.zdnet.com/article/gdpr-only-one-in-three-businesses-are-comp…
[3] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/26/slack-to-spend-at-least-250-million-on-a…
[4] https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/security/european-companies-look-bui…
[5] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/1073696…
[6] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-argentina-amazon-com/amazons-aws-unit…
[7] https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Technology/Google-boosts-Taiwan-data-ce…
[8] https://www.ctamericas.com/p-s-trial-cloud/?crcat=gsearch&crsource=na_se…
[9] https://data-economy.com/hcl-technologies-and-google-cloud-team-up-to-ra…
[10] https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/europe/germany-unveil-european-cloud…
[11] https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/france-joins-german-cloud-effort-to…
[12] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/11/technology/facebook-rejects-marc-andr…