The Internet "Batman" Signal Will Light Up Today

 Holy Cow Batman!
 http://internetdefenseleague.org/

"Following the successful defense of the Internet against SOPA, website owners are being invited to sign up to a project that will enable them to participate in future protest campaign, the Internet Defense League. The banner logo for the 'bat-signal' site is a cat, a reference to Ethan Zuckerman's cute cat theory of digital activism. The idea is that sites would respond to the call to "defend the Internet" by joining a group blackout or getting users to sign petitions. From the article: 'Website owners can sign up on the IDL website to add a bit of code to their sites (or receive code by email at the time of a campaign) that can be triggered in the case of a crisis like SOPA. This would add an "activist call-to-action" to all participating sites - such as a banner asking users to sign petitions, or in extreme cases blackout the site, as proved effective in the SOPA/PIPA protest of January 2012.'"

  The Internet Defense League, a network for website owners that would allow for the replication of a media campaign similar to the one that took down SOPA. Now it plans to spring into action in response to the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, which is now making it's way through Congress. The IDL wants its members to embed anti-CISPA banners into their websites, which will be activated today March 19th."

When the internet’s in danger and we need millions of people to act, the League will ask its members to broadcast an action. (Say, a prominent message asking everyone to call their elected leaders.) With the combined reach of our websites and social networks, we can be massively more effective than any one organization.

The organizers also plan to build some Internet censorship awareness tools, including a crowdsourced system for “identifying threats and opportunities.” The Internet has always been extremely self-aware, to the point where it’s possible to forget that there is an outside world that actually makes the laws about it.

 "Think of it like the Internet's Emergency Broadcast System, or its bat signal," the group said on its website.

Internet groups like Fight for the Future, meanwhile, have already had some success in going after cyber-security bills. The Internet blackout, for example, resulted in the demise of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA). An anti-CISPA campaign, however, did not stop its passage in the House.

Fight for the Future is also backing "Privacy is Awesome," a campaign that encourages people to call their members of Congress and urge them to vote against legislation like SOPA and CISPA.

 For more, see the Top 5 Biggest Concerns About CISPA and the Top 5 Objections to SOPA, PIPA.