In response to NSA revelations, the internet’s engineers set out to PRISM-proof the net

Greatly disturbed by the recent revelations of mass internet surveillance, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) have announced plans to ramp up online security. You may never have heard of them, but the IETF are the creators and engineers of the internet’s architecture. Is there a technical solution to the problem of mass surveillance?

For the IETF, Edward Snowden’s revelations were “a wake-up call,” said Jari Arkko, the task force’s chair. Arkko spoke at this week’s UN-initiated Internet Governance Forum in Bali, Indonesia. Surprised by the scale and tactics of surveillance, Arkko stated the engineers are “looking at technical changes that will raise the bar for monitoring.”

“Perhaps the notion that internet is by default insecure needs to change,” he said. The IETF’s will is there, and Arkko believes significant technical fixes “just might be possible.”

Technical, not political...

http://www.rnw.nl/english/article/response-nsa-revelations-internet’s-engineers-set-out-prism-proof-net