Niels Ten Oever
Biographic Data
| ID | 3079718 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Niels Ten Oever |
| GIVEN NAMES | Niels Ten |
| FAMILY NAME | Oever |
| SIGNATURE | TEN OEVER N |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Amsterdam |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5134-2199 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 13 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 14 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 13 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2020 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Infrastructural Ruptures
The rapidly changing geopolitical landscape forces us to rethink the relation between infrastructure, politics, control, and power. This panel contributes to discussions on ruptures by exploring how digital infrastructures reconfigure the state, market, and citizen nexus and presenting research approaches that interrogate transnational networks by centring their materiality. Jointly, the papers showcase how infrastructures are used as a continuat…
From critique to hope
This article explores how methodological innovation can move media and infrastructure studies from critique toward hope. Building on the infrastructural turn in media studies, we argue that research must go beyond diagnosing power asymmetries to co-creating utopian alternatives that centre people and planet over capital and control. Drawing on experiments from the critical infrastructure lab, we reflect on four methods: infrastructure walks, tran…
Infrastructural insecurity
This article argues that the production and maintenance of "infrastructural insecurity" is an inherent part of the process of the standardization of telecommunication networks. Infrastructural insecurity is the outcome of intentional practices during the production, standardization, and maintenance of communication infrastructures that leave end-users vulnerable to attacks that benefit particular actors. We ground this analysis in the qualitative…
Sanctions and infrastructural ideologies
In this paper, we interrogate the sanctions instated against Russian media by the European Union (EU) in response to Russia's aggression in Ukraine. We do this in three ways. First, we present the outcome of extensive network measurements that show the heterogeneous implementation of the sanctions in EU Member States. Second, we explain how the sanctions fit the EU's digital sovereignty agenda. And third, we theorise the EU's digital sovereignty …
Interrogating the standardisation of surveillance in 5G amid US–China competition
In this article we show that the 5G competition between the United States and Western Europe versus China is not reflected in the standardisation of lawful interception (LI) technologies in the world’s leading telecommunications standardisation body, the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). Guided by the concept of infrastructure as a site and tool of political contestation, we develop a new approach to the study of Internet governance and …
Infrastructural Insecurity
This paper argues that the production of ‘infrastructural insecurity’ is an inherent part of the standardization of information networks. Infrastructural insecurity is the outcome of an intentional process within infrastructural production, standardization, and maintenance that leaves end-users of the infrastructure vulnerable to attacks that benefit a particular actor. We ground this analysis in an interrogation of the responses to the disclosur…
G and the notion of network ideology, or
Transnational communication networks are produced in contestation between and among multinational corporations and nation-states. In the study of the governance of communication networks governance in science and technology studies, traditionally the emphasis has been on sociotechnical imaginaries (Jasanoff & Kim, 2015) which encapsulate joint futures that produce institutional configurations and the discursive roles in the power tussle between v…
Geopolitics in the infrastructural ideology of 5G
This paper explores how infrastructural ideologies function as tools in geopolitical struggles for dependence and independence between world powers. Meese et al. (2020) suggest that controversies around 5G stem from infrastructural anxieties best examined in the framework of geopolitics. We build on this work by analysing the emerging infrastructural ideology and sociotechnical imaginaries (Jasanoff and Kim, 2015) of 5G in light of the changing g…
Geopolitics in the Infrastructural Ideologies of 5g
This paper explores how infrastructural ideologies function as tools in geopolitical struggles for dependence and independence of world powers. Meese Frith and Wilken (2020) suggest that controversies around 5G stem from infrastructural anxieties best examined in the framework of geopolitics. We build on this work by analyzing the emerging infrastructural imaginary of 5G in light of the changing global division of labor. Sociotechnical imaginarie…
The Quantum State of Infrastructure Reconfiguration in 5g
Transnational information networks are a proxy for power that embody visions of futures and possibilities (Mosco 2005; DeNardis 2020). This paper looks at the topological reconfiguration of networks that comes with the development and deployment of 5G technologies. The paper argues that 5G networks exist in an apparent paradox of quantum superposition: the networks are controlled both by states and private corporations, and the intelligence is lo…
Norm conflict in the governance of transnational and distributed infrastructures
This paper explores how a deeply embedded norm can be used to exert power and control in the governance of distributed infrastructures, such as the Internet. Through the lens of norm conflict, I analyse a case of resistance against the introduction of norms in the transnational governance of Internet routing. In a mixed-methods case study, I examine through an experiment how a community of network operators resists the introduction of data protec…
This is not how we imagined it”
The Internet architecture is widely perceived as engine for innovation by providing the equal opportunity to deploy new protocols and applications. This view reflects an imaginary that guides the co-production of policy and technology that can be traced back to the early days of the Internet, which is still prominent among the engineers in one of the main governance bodies of the Internet, the Internet Engineering Taskforce (IETF). After the priv…
Optimizing Our Networked Lives
We use the term networked optimization to emphasize a sustained but changing set of techniques, technologies, and calculations to decide the best life -- the optimal -- through infrastructures, design, mathematics and engineering. Optimization is a vital concept at a time of critical interest in infrastructural power. Usually defined as doing actions to make the best or most effective use of something, our panel highlights the different uses of t…
This is not how we imagined it”
The Internet architecture is widely perceived as engine for innovation by providing the equal opportunity to deploy new protocols and applications. This view reflects an imaginary that guides the co-production of policy and technology that can be traced back to the early days of the Internet, which is still prominent among the engineers in one of the main governance bodies of the Internet, the Internet Engineering Taskforce (IETF). After the priv…
Norm conflict in the governance of transnational and distributed infrastructures
This paper explores how a deeply embedded norm can be used to exert power and control in the governance of distributed infrastructures, such as the Internet. Through the lens of norm conflict, I analyse a case of resistance against the introduction of norms in the transnational governance of Internet routing. In a mixed-methods case study, I examine through an experiment how a community of network operators resists the introduction of data protec…
Optimizing Our Networked Lives
We use the term networked optimization to emphasize a sustained but changing set of techniques, technologies, and calculations to decide the best life -- the optimal -- through infrastructures, design, mathematics and engineering. Optimization is a vital concept at a time of critical interest in infrastructural power. Usually defined as doing actions to make the best or most effective use of something, our panel highlights the different uses of t…
Geopolitics in the Infrastructural Ideologies of 5g
This paper explores how infrastructural ideologies function as tools in geopolitical struggles for dependence and independence of world powers. Meese Frith and Wilken (2020) suggest that controversies around 5G stem from infrastructural anxieties best examined in the framework of geopolitics. We build on this work by analyzing the emerging infrastructural imaginary of 5G in light of the changing global division of labor. Sociotechnical imaginarie…
The Quantum State of Infrastructure Reconfiguration in 5g
Transnational information networks are a proxy for power that embody visions of futures and possibilities (Mosco 2005; DeNardis 2020). This paper looks at the topological reconfiguration of networks that comes with the development and deployment of 5G technologies. The paper argues that 5G networks exist in an apparent paradox of quantum superposition: the networks are controlled both by states and private corporations, and the intelligence is lo…
Norm conflict in the governance of transnational and distributed infrastructures
This paper explores how a deeply embedded norm can be used to exert power and control in the governance of distributed infrastructures, such as the Internet. Through the lens of norm conflict, I analyse a case of resistance against the introduction of norms in the transnational governance of Internet routing. In a mixed-methods case study, I examine through an experiment how a community of network operators resists the introduction of data protec…
This is not how we imagined it”
The Internet architecture is widely perceived as engine for innovation by providing the equal opportunity to deploy new protocols and applications. This view reflects an imaginary that guides the co-production of policy and technology that can be traced back to the early days of the Internet, which is still prominent among the engineers in one of the main governance bodies of the Internet, the Internet Engineering Taskforce (IETF). After the priv…
Infrastructural Insecurity
This paper argues that the production of ‘infrastructural insecurity’ is an inherent part of the standardization of information networks. Infrastructural insecurity is the outcome of an intentional process within infrastructural production, standardization, and maintenance that leaves end-users of the infrastructure vulnerable to attacks that benefit a particular actor. We ground this analysis in an interrogation of the responses to the disclosur…
G and the notion of network ideology, or
Transnational communication networks are produced in contestation between and among multinational corporations and nation-states. In the study of the governance of communication networks governance in science and technology studies, traditionally the emphasis has been on sociotechnical imaginaries (Jasanoff & Kim, 2015) which encapsulate joint futures that produce institutional configurations and the discursive roles in the power tussle between v…
Geopolitics in the infrastructural ideology of 5G
This paper explores how infrastructural ideologies function as tools in geopolitical struggles for dependence and independence between world powers. Meese et al. (2020) suggest that controversies around 5G stem from infrastructural anxieties best examined in the framework of geopolitics. We build on this work by analysing the emerging infrastructural ideology and sociotechnical imaginaries (Jasanoff and Kim, 2015) of 5G in light of the changing g…
Sanctions and infrastructural ideologies
In this paper, we interrogate the sanctions instated against Russian media by the European Union (EU) in response to Russia's aggression in Ukraine. We do this in three ways. First, we present the outcome of extensive network measurements that show the heterogeneous implementation of the sanctions in EU Member States. Second, we explain how the sanctions fit the EU's digital sovereignty agenda. And third, we theorise the EU's digital sovereignty …
Interrogating the standardisation of surveillance in 5G amid US–China competition
In this article we show that the 5G competition between the United States and Western Europe versus China is not reflected in the standardisation of lawful interception (LI) technologies in the world’s leading telecommunications standardisation body, the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). Guided by the concept of infrastructure as a site and tool of political contestation, we develop a new approach to the study of Internet governance and …
Infrastructural insecurity
This article argues that the production and maintenance of "infrastructural insecurity" is an inherent part of the process of the standardization of telecommunication networks. Infrastructural insecurity is the outcome of intentional practices during the production, standardization, and maintenance of communication infrastructures that leave end-users vulnerable to attacks that benefit particular actors. We ground this analysis in the qualitative…
Infrastructural Ruptures
The rapidly changing geopolitical landscape forces us to rethink the relation between infrastructure, politics, control, and power. This panel contributes to discussions on ruptures by exploring how digital infrastructures reconfigure the state, market, and citizen nexus and presenting research approaches that interrogate transnational networks by centring their materiality. Jointly, the papers showcase how infrastructures are used as a continuat…
From critique to hope
This article explores how methodological innovation can move media and infrastructure studies from critique toward hope. Building on the infrastructural turn in media studies, we argue that research must go beyond diagnosing power asymmetries to co-creating utopian alternatives that centre people and planet over capital and control. Drawing on experiments from the critical infrastructure lab, we reflect on four methods: infrastructure walks, tran…
Computer Science (9 works) · Political science (9 works) · Law (8 works) · Politics (8 works) · Business (7 works) · Cybersecurity and Cyber Warfare Studies (7 works) · Sociology (7 works) · The Internet (7 works) · Corporate governance (6 works) · Ideology (6 works)