France has been pondering about the restriction of public Wi-Fi. (Photo : Reuters)
Due to the recent terror attacks in France, the government has been pondering about the restriction of public Wi-Fi.
Leaked documents supplied by the French newspaper Le Monde show the Minisitry of Interior's plans to pass a legislation that will empower local authorities.
One of the inclusions of this legislation is to allow the authorities to cut the public Wi-Fi hotspots during state of emergencies because it is difficult to track people who use the public networks.
They are also trying to ban the use of the Tor Browser, a browser used for anonymity, in France.
According to PC Mag, Tor spokeswoman indicated that they will always go back to their organizations mission statement: "To advance human rights and freedoms by creating and deploying free and open anonymity technologies, supporting their unrestricted availability and use, and furthering their popular understanding."
Though banning Tor in France could be challenging, it is not completely impossible. They could reach out to China who had successfully blocked Tor for their entire nation.
At the same time, the Wi-Fi limitation could also be a challenge but it is more feasible. The conflict would fall on the public's access to Internet connection.
During the past attacks, they have used Twitter and Facebook in alarming their family members of their status. If this will be implemented, not only will the public be restricted, they will probably have to go for weeks without public Wi-Fi.
The world will have to wait until January 2016 to see if France will implement such measures.
