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Interior Ministry suggests controversial ban on internet anonymity
Published: 08 December, 2011, 17:56
Is “cyber face control” needed?
TAGS: Russia, Politics, Internet
A high-ranking official from Russia’s Interior Ministry has warned of the dangers posed by social networks and has suggested a bar on Internet anonymity.
“Social networks, along with advantages, often bring a potential threat to the foundations of society,” Major-General Aleksey Moshkov said in an interview with the Rossiyskaya Gazeta on Thursday.
Moshkov, who is responsible for cyber security, added that it is on the Internet that extremist calls often appear. For instance, last year violent nationalist protests on Manege Square were organized through social networks, he recalled.
In his opinion, “cyber face control” may help tackle this problem.
“Register under your real name, give your real address and go ahead chatting. Why hide if you are an honest and law-abiding person?” Moshkov suggested, adding that they are now “leading a constructive dialogue with the Internet community so that they come to the conclusion to reduce anonymity in the web themselves.”
He also stressed that there is no censorship on the Internet and that the department for cyber security “will not seek and arrest anyone for criticism”.
The idea caused debates in the blogosphere. Presidential aide Arkady Dvorkovich was the first among state officials to react.
“It can’t be forbidden, although I personally do not understand this anonymity,” Dvorkovich wrote on his Twitter account in reply to a user who asked him to comment Aleksey Moshkov’s statement.
Ordinary users called the suggestion “unreal” and “worthless.”
08.12.2011, 17:49
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08.12.2011, 18:16
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Part 1 This always seems like a good idea, but it is not. Of course the problem is seen, that anyone can make any accusation, make any video in their bedroom, pay any actors to perform, film it and present it as truth, hey Fox news even do that in their own name! After all we have all seen, spaceships travel faster than the speed of light in films, so of course we all know it can be done! Right! So of course the kneejerk reaction comes out, ban anonymous posting. But it is not right; in the street, we all know the village idiot not to listen to, we all know the ones with an agenda…. And we learn to deal with it. We give more credence to a business with a physical address, rather than one without a physical office…. The internet is ‘new’ relatively in human communication, so people need and will become aware, how unreliable and fraudulent it is with regard individual ‘facts’. But they will also become aware that reasoning holds true regardless of bearer, and that this is one of the key benefits of the internet, the widespread leverage of reasoning, not the dissemination of ‘facts’ by individuals with agendas. So there is no need to do this, and indeed a great harm in doing it, as you scare individuals from making statements - they can become, whether for good reason or not scared to air their views. However none of this takes away the fact that we are seeing some sort of problem. But I would argue we are not seeing a problem with anonymity, but we are seeing a problem with organizations and named individuals, using data pushed anonymously as fact, and creating a non reviewed, responsibility for it.
"Register under your real name, give your real address and go ahead chatting. Why hide if you are an honest and law-abiding person?"
This is not about me hiding. It's about the rest of the world's LACK OF A NEED TO KNOW what my personal activities, opinions and preferences are.
Part 2 So the better way is to hold responsible the first named actor or organisation, that uses or publishes the anonymous information as fact. Basically they would have to prove a trail of good faith to the facts, and the onus would be on them to establish it, to avoid criminal and civil sanction. This allows anonymity to reign, responsibility to be manifested, and the internet community to develop and realise, that ‘facts’ are few and far between from anonymous actors.