Security and privacy indicate a need for anonymity online. But fakery and lies compete with the genuine and the accountable online, and argue for verification of identity. These seemingly opposite requirements are presently causing us much angst.
One might note headlines this year about hacks of all kinds, even of governments against other governments in a new kind of actual warfare. Flood your enemy’s communication channels with bogus materials, and their society can no longer find the signal, the truth, in all the noise. Or steal their secrets by hacking, including industrial and military, and leak their corporate emails.
We’ve had fake news on Facebook that influences an election. We’ve had ubiquitous fear of trolls and harassment, cat fishing, identity theft, intimidation, online stalking, and worse.
OTOH, we have crowdsourcing of “doing good” projects, instant access to most all the world’s knowledge, connections with anyone anywhere. We have people finding mates to actually trust and marry online. Families separated by physical distance are staying in touch with Skype and FaceTime. Local governments find new ways to connect with citizens and enable involvement.
Myriad other benefits newly exist of open and faithful communication made possible by online tools, such as learning, and job search and healthcare information/ services, and support groups for whatever your problem might be. etc. etc.
So, our brave new world is decidedly a mixed bag, and attempting to remove the “bad stuff” might throw the “good stuff” out with the bath water. There’s actually a parable that applies, when Jesus was talking to the disciples about the problem of the wheat and the tares. Tares being weeds growing in the field with the wheat, but if you try to remove the tares, you also remove the wheat. So….
Perhaps it’s not a surprise that the online virtual world would come to reflect and echo and reinstate the problems of the IRL world.
Perhaps 2016 is the year when the full challenge of moving our communication systems to the three legged stool of one to many, many to one, and many to many… comes into stark relief. We are going to have to do much better with this if civilization is to thrive.
No, this post isn’t about to reveal all the answers. PSA is a positive and hopeful agent in the online world, but here’s a couple links touching on some of the most troublesome aspects of the problem as of today:
[gview file=”https://publicservicesalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Fixation-on-Fake-News-Overshadows-Waning-Trust-in-Real-Reporting-The-New-York-Times.pdf”] [gview file=”https://publicservicesalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Zuckerberg-Says-He’ll-Take-Steps-to-Solve-Facebook-Fake-News-Bloomberg.pdf”]