Authoritarian regimes are increasingly adept at fragmenting and controlling the internet for purposes of censorship, surveillance, and internal and external propaganda and misinformation, note analysts Mario Loyola and James K. Glassman. The US has failed to counter this with an effective strategy that gives US public diplomacy the capabilities and missions needed for success in the information war, they write for the American Enterprise Institute:
Instead of focusing on producing original content, US public diplomacy and international broadcasting should embrace a 21st-century, multimedia, public broadcasting model to promote American values and truthful information in cyberspace.
The US should also strengthen and use existing tools of US diplomacy to advance freedom online as a universal (and universally accessible) human right, such as the multistakeholder internet governance forums, the Freedom Online Coalition, the National Endowment for Democracy, and State Department reports on internet freedom.
