Anonymity

French Senator Proposes Outlawing Anonymous Blogging (TechDirt, 02 June 2010)

Twitter Fighting Pennsylvania Subpoena Seeking Names of 2 Tweeters from the NY Times as cited on 20 May 2010 on the Business and HR Watch website http://www.business-humanrights.org/Links/Repository/1001004

some would obviously benefit from anonymity for illegal purposes...!

If You're Trying To Sell Insider Info, Perhaps Don't Randomly Email Dozens Of Investors (TechDirt, 28 May 2010)

Hyping issues up: distortions when it comes to internet

1 - "The Real Problem With Internet Comments Isn't Anonymity" (TechDirt, 12 April 2010). That I would agree; people before internet could be anonymous for the better or for the worse (blackmail...). They could also be discovered and were accepting the risk; so why not now? Why the internet should change anything in us allowing anonymity? What we need is better education for people to understand the impact of their behaviours and better policing, but not an end to anonymity.
"Judge Who Was Revealed As Anonymous Commenter Sues Newspaper For $50 Million" (TechDirt, 8 April 2010)
"Israeli Supreme Court Says There Is No Legal Way To Reveal Anonymous Commenters Online" (TechDirt, 1 April 2010)
Columnist Claims Anonymity Is Bad For Our Country (TechDirt, 31 March 2010)


2 - "Dear Journalists: There Is No Cyberwar" (TechDirt, 9 April 2010). I don't completely agree. Governments use and will use the new technologies to attack and the disruptions will be different.

3 - As Cyberbullying Moral Panics Heat Up, Actual Rates Of Cyberbullying Decreasing (TechDirt, 9 April 2010). Well yes and no. Cyberbullying is a problem like its off-line version, but it is probably not so much of a problem as it is made up.

Similar distortion in the understanding of the law in order to catch behaviours we find offensive but which are not necessarily legal:
Son Gets Mom Charged With Harassment Over Facebook Account Hijacking (TechDirt, 8 April 2010) - apparently, the son lets the computer logged in; that is unauthorised access in the UK!
And if this is true, it is even worse: Sarkozy Kicks Off Criminal Investigation Into Blog/Twitter Reports He Had An Affair (TechDirt, 7 April 2010)

4 - or distortion in the use of the law: "Court Says President Bush Violated Wiretapping Laws With Warrantless Wiretap" (TechDirt, 31 March 2010) with Wired having published the decision from NorthDistrict Court of California http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/threatlevel/2010/03/walker.pdf

This affair echoes two others about procedure and the difficulties to conceptualise it:
"Leaving Your WiFi Open Decreases Your Fourth Amendment Rights To Privacy?" (TechDirt, 10 February 2010) - I can't see how there is less privacy if you leave your mobile phone or your landline accessible to people from the outside
"Duh, Don't Leave A Thumb Drive With Child Porn Plugged Into A Shared Computer" (TechDirt, 22 April 2010) - no expectation of privacy for a US court when the thumb drive is plugged in. I would agree (like Masnick and unlike Kerr with whom I seem to disagree quite a lot - he writes on VWs). Kerr argues the thumb drive is like a suitcase in a public space; inaccurate if it is plugged in as everybody can see what's in it, like an open suitcase (aka Masnick).

and see "Les points-clés du projet de loi Loppsi" (LeMonde, 09 February 2010)

Passport control: awaking the dead

"Is Elvis Dead? Who Knows, But His Passport Made It Through Airport Security In Amsterdam", TechDirt 01 March 2010

I like the irony of it all. Trying to secure identities of people, and yet failing badly...

The power of images and data

Three articles, all connected around several themes.

The first one is about Chatroulette's site which works on the basis of logging in for random chats with people all over the world (well, at least that is what they tell you). The principle may seem great but exhibitionists and voyeurs populate the site so much that whoever uses it is sure to encounter some unpleasant images or chat on a regular basis, about one every ten chats. The problem is that students, children, anybody has access to it.
What I found fascinating is the fact that people want to spend time at random with images displayed, often of their own private homes. There is a sense that their privacy is not infringed because the others do not know where they live... But that is on the basis that they reveal nothing of themselves. Yet, even with one image (that can be captured from the webcam), somebody can start tracking down the person since some websites allow to search for matching pictures. Anonymity cannot really exist.

"Online voyeurs flock to the random thrills of Chatroulette", The Observer, 14 February 2010 page 20
On an anedoctal use of Chatroulette, "Band 'Releases' New Album Via Chatroulette" 15 February 2010
and for the French Secretary of State to ask for regulation of Internet at an international level: "Nadine Morano demande à l’ONU de réguler Internet", 01net, 25 February 2010

The second article is about comments made by Mark Zuckerberg, one of the founders of Facebook that "people have gotten really comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people", and that lack of privacy as a "social norm". The article astutely points out the constrast between the affirmation and the reality of Mr Zuckerberg's behaviour to withdraw pictures from his facebook page! We may feel comfortable with others' lack of privacy, but not with our own. There is here an element of voyeurism, like with gossip: it is fine to gossip about others, but not about ourselves!
Even more interesting is a Sunday Times poll explained in the article, where 63% disagree with the statement that privacy matters less than before and 70% say they are worried about communication of private data.
There is an obvious need to redefine privacy in the internet age, I would add, in the Facebook age. What does it mean in legal terms?
There is also a question of education and responsiblity here. All those examples of people having posted images of others (without their knowledge) in embarrassing situations with unintended consequences of loss of jobs, refusal of qualification etc... There is a need to learn about our responsiblity towards others, like when on the road, and seeing a bad driver - one cannot pretend not seeing him/her and continue driving, one has to adapt-; but there is also a need to learn not to take images at face value, that seeing somebody being drunk once does not mean s/he is unfit for a job. Relativity... a new relationship to images and words on the net...

"Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg says privacy is dead. So why does he want to keeps this picture hidden?" The Sunday Times, 17 January 2010 page 12

For an earlier version of the same problem on Facebook, "Public lives: Does the internet know too much about us?", The Independent, 30 June 2008

The third article is about the EU being worried about Google and the YouTube case in Italy. Europe Looms as Major Battleground for Google, The NY Times, 14 February 2010 (the printed version is titled: In Europe, Unease with Google's Power Grows - bad English by the way)


On the issue of privacy and speech, see Global Network Initiative

Online personality and offline identity

Techdirt Daily Email for Tuesday, 09 March 2010 - Outlook Web Access Light

and "Turns Out That People Are Actually Pretty Honest About Themselves Online" TechDirt 19 February 2010

Not many studies appear on the theme; I suppose that the methodology to research online is not the easiest to practice. BUt it seems that people behave offline and online in pretty similar ways. It certainly corresponds to other studies that examine how people on the long term would present themselves and the discovery that the differences between online and offline are minor.

Anonymity on the web

A very simple explanation, common sense, but as true as for anonymity by post mail: can't certify identities without using existing means of identification...

"You Can't Get Rid Of Anonymity Online, Even If You Wanted To" (TechDirt, 4 February 2010) refering to the blog of Bruno Schneier http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/02/anonymity_and_t_3.html


A change compared to the UK court position earlier on a blog written by a police officer:
"Israeli Court Supports Anonymity For Online Commenters" (TechDirt 26 January 2010)