What Would Cause Massive Amounts of People to Abandon the Internet?

[Cli-Fi]

It's worth noting that Iran has their own distinct internet network:
Iran rolls out domestic internet - BBC News

I'm not sure if North Korea does, of whether it's simply an extremely filtered version of the WWW.

Doesn't Syria as well? I am not really going to focus on the rest of the world, and not necessarily how the rest of the world really connects to the net. NK's net is full of propaganda anyway, and they are perfectly happy to use it haha.

The clogging of the net (as was reported over the weekend) is a good place to start

 

[RX-79G]

You could also just have the internet replaced by something better, but the old internet running underneath it.

 

[Mirannan]

This is on the border between horror and SF, but how about a self-propagating virus that creates graphics which do something really nasty to the mind of anyone viewing it? Something like the scenario in Snow Crash, except that viewers are effectively recruited into a botnet. I played this for laughs once, in a Call of Cthulhu campaign that was obviously on its way out because of people losing interest. My character got hold of one of the virus-writing kits that can be found if you look hard enough, and added a fairly big chunk of the lovely book "Unaussprechlichen Kulten" to the product as payload just for giggles.

Charles Stross has some ideas along these lines, too. The Laundry Sequence, for example.

 

[Stephen Thompson]

The internet is currently not policed in any meaningful way, which is why people get away with a lot of what they do.

You could have a scenario where it's suddenly decided that the internet be policed and everyone's every action is watched (think china, north korea etc) and infractions are punished brutally. I'd abandon the internet if that happens.

If you wanted to be super realistic about it, most internet users would migrate to Tor and the likes initially, until all that got cracked, then they'd just stop using it.

Whoever these internet polices would be would need to be able to operate without borders and have branches in every country.

The internet is going that way anyway so all you're doing is pushing a button that's already half pushed.

 

[Dan Jones]

I'd go with @VinceK's idea - the IOT is rife with security issues and connectivity is spreading hugely. You could also factor in autonomy issues and breaches of personal data. I've recently written a paper for a Government agency on cyber security issues in the UK and where the main threats are. I can't share it with you (for obvious reasons), but I can talk to you about some of the issues at a high level if you like. PM me if you're interested

 

[Cli-Fi]

I'd go with @VinceK's idea - the IOT is rife with security issues and connectivity is spreading hugely. You could also factor in autonomy issues and breaches of personal data. I've recently written a paper for a Government agency on cyber security issues in the UK and where the main threats are. I can't share it with you (for obvious reasons), but I can talk to you about some of the issues at a high level if you like. PM me if you're interested

Thanks @DG Jones. I'm in IT myself so I have a bit of experience in these matters. As I'm writing I will definitely ask you for advice. Though, this isn't an in your face scenario, like OMG there is no internet anymore. The shock of that has already worn off and I think the majority of the book will focus on how people will deal with that and how the VR world copes with what happened on the outside once my MC tells them.

There's one phrase in particular which sets things up where one of the government agents in charge of technology retrieval, goes and says, "I hope the desire to use the internet gets bred out in the next generation." So that highlights where I want to go with this and the political undertones of this comment would be seen as totally prejudicial today

If the book was mainly about the internet going offline, I would totally focus more on it, but that's not exactly what I want to write about right now. Maybe in a prequel, but I think there is a much more tantalizing story here about how people deal with the fact that there is no internet and the totally separate culture that the VR world has created. Which would ultimately remind the non-VR world why the internet is no more as it is.

So it will be talked about in subtle form, but I think ultimately no one will know what really happened until the main mystery of the novel is solved.

 

[Cli-Fi]

I'd go with @VinceK's idea - the IOT is rife with security issues and connectivity is spreading hugely. You could also factor in autonomy issues and breaches of personal data. I've recently written a paper for a Government agency on cyber security issues in the UK and where the main threats are. I can't share it with you (for obvious reasons), but I can talk to you about some of the issues at a high level if you like. PM me if you're interested

The summary for The Disconnect is here. First Chapter to be posted ASAP: The Disconnect Summary/Idea (Sci-fi thriller) Everyone can feel free to let me know what they think.

 

[Ursa major]

Charles Stross has some ideas along these lines, too. The Laundry Sequence, for example.

Stephanie Saulter, in her ®evolution trilogy, uses another concept built upon the effect of the Internet on its users: not so much particular patterns, but the consequences of continual use.

(It's actually part of the world building and backstory, rather than in the plots. The trilogy is set in a world where this problem has been overcome by genetic engineering, and the characters have to deal with the fallout from the increased ability to genetically engineering human beings).

 

[Cli-Fi]

Stephanie Saulter, in her ®evolution trilogy, uses another concept built upon the effect of the Internet on its users: not so much particular patterns, but the consequences of continual use.

(It's actually part of the world building and backstory, rather than in the plots. The trilogy is set in a world where this problem has been overcome by genetic engineering, and the characters have to deal with the fallout from the increased ability to genetically engineering human beings).

Yeah that novel's world building and backstory really seems to have a similar style as to what I am going for here. It looks interesting.

 

[ErikB]

The discovery that a new technology had turned monitors into surveillance relay systems, that record everything visually through screens.

That smart phones, computers, and even tablets everywhere were spying on citizens even when they appeared blank. That audio was also hijacked and unless it was off that these devices where no longer safe.

Your antagonist could be government, other organized crime enterprises, or an evil crime lord etc. But larger groups means more invasive monitoring. It would turn off large numbers of folks from using the net or devices such as computers, phones, tablets/notebooks, etc.