The internet

[Marine Cpl]

I don't understand this disaster. Welfare wouldn't be paid to electronic cards and then eventually they'll go out via check.

Store orders would go out via landline or paper mail. All government agencies have paper backups. Most stores and distributers do too. Those that don't would get things going via paper quick if they want to stay in business.

A nuisance in the very beginning but certainly not a disaster.

Paper checks and mail still exist.

 

[Jackalope]

I don't see a disaster scenario either. There may be regional outages, but the topography of the internet provides resiliency, so any outages would be localized. There's no internet kill switch here in the U.S., and with around 8000 internet service providers, it would be difficult to put them all out of commission at once. Unless there was an EMP or a CME, and then the internet would be the least of your worries.

I've worked in data communications since the late '70's, and the work I do now is somewhat dependent upon the internet. The agency I work for experienced an internet outage of several days due to a backhoe taking out a line. We have provisions for internet outages, we went to Plan B and all was well, and most governmental agencies have a plan in place, just in case the internet goes out.

Serious;y, I would worry more about the loss of electricity rather than the internet.

 

[ProgSpear]

Old guys and gals on meds would have a real tough time when the meds ran out. Note that the commies made sure that every single medically related thing is totally dependent on electronic records, 'cause like opioid abuse or something... When EMP smokes the records, lots and lots of people will automatically die.

 

[Marine Cpl]

Old guys and gals on meds would have a real tough time when the meds ran out. Note that the commies made sure that every single medically related thing is totally dependent on electronic records, 'cause like opioid abuse or something... When EMP smokes the records, lots and lots of people will automatically die.

A phone call from a landline would remedy that in this hypothetical situation where only internet and cell phones go down permanently but not electricity.

 

[spat]

A phone call from a landline would remedy that in this hypothetical situation where only internet and cell phones go down permanently but not electricity.

You guys dont realize how much that landline is dependant on the internet.

I guess it depends on what you mean by "the internet went down". If you just mean the public layer 3 network, then yes, but that wouldn't staydown for long. Something that can take really take that down for any length of time would take down a lot more.

 

[Criticalt]

I don't understand this disaster. Welfare wouldn't be paid to electronic cards and then eventually they'll go out via check.

Store orders would go out via landline or paper mail. All government agencies have paper backups. Most stores and distributers do too. Those that don't would get things going via paper quick if they want to stay in business.

A nuisance in the very beginning but certainly not a disaster.

Paper checks and mail still exist.

I do not know about other companies but.......
My GF works for a LARGE chain store as an HR manager.
In the middle of the day sometimes their internet goes down.
They have backup systems in place whereas everything goes as normal. Except people wont get their bonus points maybe.
All their internal systems work without internet.
This is a store that sells underwear and toothbrushes, id hope more important businesses have similar systems in place.
Even paychecks can be printed in house, without internet.

 

[Criticalt]

Hell, if the power grid eent down Id be ok.
Life may be more interesting but ok.
We dont even have a computer.
We have internet for TV ONLY.
Literally the only thing I use internet for tv and 2 forums.
With no internet I still have food, water and shelter.
I could go for years just bartering with my Amish neighbors. Which is what we do alot now.
Berries for butter
Beef for pork
Hay for alfalfa
Bring it on.

 

[GOPerfect]

Anyone that thinks their lives would not be effected due to the lose of the internet are really clueless of how the world works today. Yeah, things would be back to normal in no time... Yeah, right.

 

[spat]

I do not know about other companies but.......
My GF works for a LARGE chain store as an HR manager.
In the middle of the day sometimes their internet goes down.
They have backup systems in place whereas everything goes as normal. Except people wont get their bonus points maybe.
All their internal systems work without internet.
This is a store that sells underwear and toothbrushes, id hope more important businesses have similar systems in place.
Even paychecks can be printed in house, without internet.

When the post office can't deliver their mail and the phone company can't complete their calls, and the banks can't cash their checks how well will their "backup plans" work ?

One little corner of the internet being down is no big deal, but the whole thing going down takes *a lot* of infrastructure with it.

 

[Marine Cpl]

Anyone that thinks their lives would not be effected due to the lose of the internet are really clueless of how the world works today. Yeah, things would be back to normal in no time... Yeah, right.

Care to explain since we are clueless?

Because as I see it, there would be major inconveniences that would be worked out eventually but definitely no balls to the walls shtf like if the power went out permanently from an EMP for example.

 

[Marine Cpl]

When the post office can't deliver their mail and the phone company can't complete their calls, and the banks can't cash their checks how well will their "backup plans" work ?

One little corner of the internet being down is no big deal, but the whole thing going down takes *a lot* of infrastructure with it.

How will the post office not be able to deliver mail? Will roads he closed? Will trucks get disabled? Will refineries shut down?

The gov would just print money and deliver it to banks. It may take some time but the country isn't going to come to a crashing halt permanently.

And like I said earlier. Checks will still work. The bank may not have the cash but checks will still work. Before the internet, banks never had the actual cash dollar to dollar. It worked on an iou system.

 

[Drinkthekoolaid]

Care to explain since we are clueless?

Because as I see it, there would be major inconveniences that would be worked out eventually but definitely no balls to the walls shtf like if the power went out permanently from an EMP for example.

My cynicism for a major and extended internet outage being a big deal to our way of life and economy are based on my personal experiences with reading too much, thinking how systems are inter connected and experiences working at my current company.

I'm trying to be deliberately vague so I'm leaving out key details which would help my point but I'm being as vague as possible. But where I work I have a thorough understanding of how their production, logistics, trucking, delivery all interface together. It's a corporation. The products they produce and distribute go to major industrial and medical customers. Places like hospitals, steel mills, oil refineries, power plants etc..

Our individual trucking and production facilities are not able to ship anything without the central office for multiple reasons. Without these products bad things will happen, there will be damage and shut downs to industry and/or people will die. There is no plan to handle this without the internet, the way everything is set up it would just grind to ahhalt. Again, there are many reasons why this is, in being deliberately vague . if you PM me I might give more information if you were interested.

I'm sure that my company isn't unique in its set up and many others would experience significant difficulties to performing routine tasks

 

[spat]

How will the post office not be able to deliver mail? Will roads he closed? Will trucks get disabled? Will refineries shut down?

The gov would just print money and deliver it to banks. It may take some time but the country isn't going to come to a crashing halt permanently.

And like I said earlier. Checks will still work. The bank may not have the cash but checks will still work. Before the internet, banks never had the actual cash dollar to dollar. It worked on an iou system.

Before the internet the banks didn't use the internet to clear all the checks you process. They aren't going to go back to just taking your word that there is money in the account.

All the people who did that work were replaced by internet connected computers.

Same for the mail sorting machines the post office uses.

You can't just snap your fingers and get that infrastructure back overnight. These things were "internet enabled" so that that work could be eliminated. The people who did it are gone. There aren't even people to train the new people how to do it, they'll basically have to figure out new processes all over again.

It can be done, but don't expect them to just snap their fingers and have it working next week. Chances are the internet would be back up before the "old school" methods would be working again.

 

[Marine Cpl]

Before the internet the banks didn't use the internet to clear all the checks you process. They aren't going to go back to just taking your word that there is money in the account.

All the people who did that work were replaced by internet connected computers.

Same for the mail sorting machines the post office uses.

You can't just snap your fingers and get that infrastructure back overnight. These things were "internet enabled" so that that work could be eliminated. The people who did it are gone. There aren't even people to train the new people how to do it, they'll basically have to figure out new processes all over again.

It can be done, but don't expect them to just snap their fingers and have it working next week. Chances are the internet would be back up before the "old school" methods would be working again.

Agreed. It'll take weeks but it isn't going to just crash down into full EMP SHTF. It'll get sorted out as quick as possible so that they can continue making money.

 

[spat]

Agreed. It'll take weeks but it isn't going to just crash down into full EMP SHTF. It'll get sorted out as quick as possible so that they can continue making money.

You shut that stuff down for weeks, and other stuff will crash too, you can't just reboot a whole economy.

We'd be Venezuela inside of 2 weeks.

 

[Marine Cpl]

You shut that stuff down for weeks, and other stuff will crash too, you can't just reboot a whole economy.

We'd be Venezuela inside of 2 weeks.

I disagree. The economy will tank, crime will spike but it'll eventually settle down. Look at Puerto Rico. That was a full on power failure and not just a hypothetical internet failure.

 

[spat]

I disagree. The economy will tank, crime will spike but it'll eventually settle down. Look at Puerto Rico. That was a full on power failure and not just a hypothetical internet failure.

It also had the mainland for life support.

There would be nobody to ship in all the emergency supplies and keep things on life support if everything went down.

 

[Marine Cpl]

It also had the mainland for life support.

There would be nobody to ship in all the emergency supplies and keep things on life support if everything went down.

Right but we aren't taking a power loss in this hypothetical internet loss.

All the government has to do is print money and deliver it to banks. Once that's done, things will settle down.

The economy would even spike because now they need to hire actual people to do jobs that computers used to do.

 

[GOPerfect]

Care to explain since we are clueless?

Because as I see it, there would be major inconveniences that would be worked out eventually but definitely no balls to the walls shtf like if the power went out permanently from an EMP for example.

Agreed. It'll take weeks but it isn't going to just crash down into full EMP SHTF. It'll get sorted out as quick as possible so that they can continue making money.

Don't get me wrong at all, a n incident like an EMP would be devastating. The internet dropping, well...

First and foremost, the ENTIRE electric grid is run through the Internet. All of it. Every aspect is on line. Sure, things would get better after some time, weeks? No way, months and months. Crime would go through the roof. Peoples paychecks depend on the internet. How many are going to go to work if not being paid?

"The stock market would likely be closed in a total internet outage. Credit transactions for purchases would stop. No bank to bank transactions....I would say a major internet outage constitutes a national emergency. Could we survive and recover? Sure, eventually.

Traffic is snarled because lights run on computers and the computers can’t get updates. After 3-4 hours, even the public transit is taken offline...Day-to-day services also start to break down pretty quickly. Of course all the credit card machines are down, along with all the ATMs. So everyone only has as much spending money as they have in their wallets. Nearly all gas stations are run through the web, no internet, no gas.


The list goes on and on

 

[Marine Cpl]

Don't get me wrong at all, a n incident like an EMP would be devastating. The internet dropping, well...

First and foremost, the ENTIRE electric grid is run through the Internet. All of it. Every aspect is on line. Sure, things would get better after some time, weeks? No way, months and months. Crime would go through the roof. Peoples paychecks depend on the internet. How many are going to go to work if not being paid?

"The stock market would likely be closed in a total internet outage. Credit transactions for purchases would stop. No bank to bank transactions....I would say a major internet outage constitutes a national emergency. Could we survive and recover? Sure, eventually.

Traffic is snarled because lights run on computers and the computers can’t get updates. After 3-4 hours, even the public transit is taken offline...Day-to-day services also start to break down pretty quickly. Of course all the credit card machines are down, along with all the ATMs. So everyone only has as much spending money as they have in their wallets. Nearly all gas stations are run through the web, no internet, no gas.


The list goes on and on

So then we should change the title of this thread to be if the power goes out. Because this hypothetical is just internet only.

 

[GOPerfect]

So then we should change the title of this thread to be if the power goes out. Because this hypothetical is just internet only.

Hey, I have had a rough couple of days, don't mess with me.

Going to the gym, I'll check in later.

 

[Drinkthekoolaid]

So then we should change the title of this thread to be if the power goes out. Because this hypothetical is just internet only.

Losing the internet would be the event that would cause a while bunch of unexpected and maybe unpredictable layers of cascading failures through our economy and way of life.

Losing "just" the internet is different than a power failure, EMP etc.. Some effects would be shared between these events where others would not be.

I still think It would be much more damaging and have a larger impact than people realize.

 

[Marine Cpl]

You could never just lose the internet though.

 

[GOPerfect]

Not all electrical go down smaller plants like the one in Batavia is independent.

Electronics would still work cars would still run so the internet going down much different than an all-out electrical failure.


Stick that in your pipe and smoke it

 

[Marine Cpl]

What if power went out permanently but part of the internet remained on battery backup and generator?

 

[NirvanaFan]

I guess part of the scenario depends on why the internet went down. Do all the routers and switches stop working? That would take down internal networks and cause hundreds of millions or billions of people around the world to die. Losing just the internet for an extended period of time would still have devastating effects.

Planning on telephoning in your orders? Impossible. Phone calls are routed over the internet.
Hospitals couldn't get necessary supplies in time. Doctor's couldn't look up medical records. Going to get an MRI would take a month to get the results. Have to make an appointment at your doctor, go into the doctor's office, get an MRI order, go to the MRI place, make an appointment, go back to your doctor's, make an appointment, go back to the MRI place to get it done, take a thumb drive with the necessary files on it with you to your next doctor's appointment, have him look at it while you are there for the first time (which will take more of your and his time).

Our entire financial system is dependent on the internet.

I don't think everyone realizes how important internet communication is for the vast majority of people. Millions of people would die.

 

[Marine Cpl]

But how can just the internet go down permanently?

 

[NirvanaFan]

But how can just the internet go down permanently?

I can't think of a realistic scenario where just that would happen, but it was the hypothetical we were working with. Intranets work, but Internet doesn't.

 

[GOPerfect]

But how can just the internet go down permanently?

That's the thing, doesn't have to go down forever. Think on a smaller scale, two-three weeks.

 

[Marine Cpl]

That's the thing, doesn't have to go down forever. Think on a smaller scale, two-three weeks.

Technically speaking it can't just go down country or world wide unless the power went out. That's what I'm saying.