The Joy of Handles (1992)(textfiles.com)
textfiles.com
The Joy of Handles (1992)
http://www.textfiles.com/100/anonymit
5 comments
> There's nothing to be gained from knowing someone's "Real name",... Thus, anyone who claims too loudly to be using their real name is making a bluff which is difficult to call them on...
What? Calling such a bluff is not so hard: with a full name and just a bit more info (e.g. birth date, partial SSN, mother's maiden name), you're well on your way to stealing someone's identity. With a full name and forum handle, you may have blackmail material. If the information is fake, you lose nothing by trying a dozen "John Smiths." Read Kevin Mitnick's books for how far you can get with persistence and just a bit of knowledge.
Robustly faking information takes effort; most people are too lazy or careless to do so every single time they write something online, and the Internet is Forever. However, handles add a bit of friction to the stalking/surveillance process, likely enough to prevent idle snooping and bulk collection.
What? Calling such a bluff is not so hard: with a full name and just a bit more info (e.g. birth date, partial SSN, mother's maiden name), you're well on your way to stealing someone's identity. With a full name and forum handle, you may have blackmail material. If the information is fake, you lose nothing by trying a dozen "John Smiths." Read Kevin Mitnick's books for how far you can get with persistence and just a bit of knowledge.
Robustly faking information takes effort; most people are too lazy or careless to do so every single time they write something online, and the Internet is Forever. However, handles add a bit of friction to the stalking/surveillance process, likely enough to prevent idle snooping and bulk collection.
Regardless, if you need someone's real name, you should probably meet them in person anyway.
And this is why I use Craigslist and not Ebay: it's hard to run a large-scale scam by meeting people in person.
In the future will anyone be able to run for president without getting scrutinized for every YouTube comment, Flickr photo, Facebook tag, or forum post they made in their entire life?
Handles are great but these days it's too easy to track people down, even if they use multiples.
Handles are great but these days it's too easy to track people down, even if they use multiples.
Even if you do, surely we've learned by now that any information which can be transferred via the Internet is rather trivial to fake; all photos, scans, and other files are subject to being modified and are, therefore, immediately suspect. (This could be changed, if governments were in the habit of giving people cryptographically signed documents verifying identity. They're not, and if they were, woe betide the person idiotic enough to give such documents to any third party.) Thus, anyone who claims too loudly to be using their real name is making a bluff which is difficult to call them on, something which should be kept in mind.
The idea that there are 'consequences' for everyone's actions is central to some worldviews. The question then becomes, one, Who is in a position to decide which actions have 'consequences'?, and, two, Who is in a position to decide which 'consequences' are just? Being anonymous is one layer of protection against some of the people who take such duties on themselves, as the paper points out.