Behold the “Shadow” internet

Have a look what Hillary Clinton is up to…

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/12/world/12internet.html?_r=1&hp

This is an offshoot of what happened when Egypt pulled the plug on the internet (I wonder if Mubarak would still be in office if he hadn’t messed with the Internet?)

The basic idea is to use a WiFi (and soon WiMax/LTE) “Mesh”.   When you configured your WiFi connection, the normal option is you type in the SSID (System ID) of your router and you create a direct connection between your computer/phone and your router.

But that’s not the only option – you could set WiFi to be a peer to peer (“Ad Hoc”) network, allowing your computers and devices to talk with each other without going through the router at all.   That’s basically how some wireless printers work.

http://compnetworking.about.com/od/wireless/ht/setupadhocwifi.htm

The SSID (and channel number) as set to the “Secret” network name – when anyone that is part of the network comes in range of each other, the two computers/phones start to talk with each other.  

That doesn’t get you onto the actual internet, but if you want to transfer videos to each other or a leader wants to send a message to every phone a crowd (that’s part of the secret network)   “Okay, let’s rush the stage now”…  it isn’t using the internet, it isn’t using the phone system, and would be very hard to shut down.