Image from Substratum press kit
The Internet is Dead !
Okay, so that's a little over dramatic. The internet isn't dead, but yesterday in the USA the FCC voted 3-2 to repeal the laws protecting net neutrality that were put in place back in 2015. The laws aren't immediately stricken, the repeal still needs to be voted through congress. But with the majority Republican controlled congress it is widely believed that it will pass.
This is bad news, ISPs will be able to throttle any connection to a server they feel is bad, either because it is criminal activity or competition. This will make it very difficult for new tech companies that may have to pay a lot of money to have a decent connection, or any connection at all if the telcom companies think that the new upstart could be more competition than they want to deal with.
In fact, the only ones it really helps are the telecom companies like Verizon, Comcast, or AT&T.
Is there an answer ?
This is the big question, is there an answer to the removal of net neutrality (other than DON'T TAKE MY INTERNET) ? Right now, not really. But Substratum is already in the process of coming up with a solution.
Substratum Network
The Substratum Network will be a network of nodes hosted by normal people all around the world and is being designed directly at the protocol level instead of on top of it. This will allow internet traffic to be routed around from node to node and your ISP will only ever see you connecting to another user's computer, not you trying to connect to a specific company's servers.
Image from Substratum site
Hidden in Plain Sight
Because the Substratum network is being programmed at the service level they were able to hide the packets by making them look just like normal http/https packets, helping to protect the packets from being detected and filtered out (blocked). This means telecom companies can't put a blanket stop of Substratum traffic across their network, they won't be able to differentiate it from the normal traffic around it.
Access to Information
Substratum has also been able to develop the network so that any content hosted on it will be accessible without downloading the node software, without downloading any additional software actually !
All you need is a web browser and you can access anything hosted on the Substratum network. While this is cool, what's even cooler is the fact that they were able to get it working in the other way. If you are running a Substratum node you will be able to access content not hosted on the network, from anywhere in the world.
This will allow people from countries where the internet is restricted to freely access content that would normally be blocked. But a common use of it I believe will be circumventing region blocked content.
Bittersweet
The vote turned out to be a bittersweet event for some. While any loss of net neutrality anywhere is bad news, this decision will boost the interest and awareness of Substratum. They are currently working towards the release of a beta client and are some of the most communicative developers I have seen !
This is definitely something to keep your eye on, it's gonna be big !