Musings & Rambles

Cyber Intelligence. Ah, the perfect phrase to spark a heated debate over privacy rights, government spies, and “hackers”. But should we really be getting our knickers in a knot over it? I think not. In fact, I think online intelligence is actually a really, really good thing.

First off, it was put in place for a reason! Governments of the world didn’t come up with the idea as a cover for sifting through cat videos in your browser history; they implemented it to catch the “bad guys”. In other words, they snoop in your online activities if you are already a suspect in an investigation and they have reason to be snooping (usually in connection with terrorism), not simply at will.

Believe it or not, terrorists are very active online, and it is through this activity that intelligence agencies can track down actual individuals behind a computer screen. However, if these agencies could not obtain access to your online activity after naming you suspect, they would not be able to further their investigation and put a stop to your harmful activity. This is where Internet service providers (ISPs) come in. ISPs store your online information for times such as these – but don’t panic! As I said before, this info is not available for amusement or misuse by individual intelligence officers – it is there to be retrieved in times where it can further an investigation.

Here’s an analogy: When you’re at an appointment with your shrink, you are in a secure and confidential environment. They assure you that what you say during the appointment will not be repeated; however, they often take notes through the conversation and then store these notes in a filing cabinet in the corner. These notes are like your online activities. They are secure, but still recorded and stored, and are only retrieved when they contain information that proves you guilty of some atrocity. And even then, authorities must obtain a warrant in order to take the notes/internet history from their secure storage.

It is for these reasons (among others) that I believe cyber intelligence does more good than harm. From my perspective it does no harm at all, unless you happen to be guilty of some horrible crime. And even then, you may slip by unnoticed, due to the lack of an ever-watchful eye behind your computer screen.

While the World Wide Web can be a glorious thing, it also has quite the dark side. One aspect of this is the effect of anonymity, and how it drives people to act in ways that they would (should) not in real life. Particularly with regard to comments on sites such as YouTube, Reddit, etc. where an individual can comment under a username that does not represent their true identity. For example, in the following image, you can see 2 comments posted on a video I uploaded to Reddit – and how vicious people can get over the most innocent of things (internet bullies feed off of innocence). In the case of the 2nd commenter, their username renders them completely anonymous because it doesn’t portray an actual name. In the case of the 1st commenter, they could be writing under a pseudonym. Instead of a boy named Graeme, it could really be a Nick, or Susan, or Bob.

Vicious Comments on Reddit

This is not to say that the websites themselves are not partially to blame. Providing options to “dislike” or “down-vote” another person’s post provides an easy way for people to spread hate, whilst remaining completely anonymous. A famous example of hate spread in this way can be found on the YouTube video of Rebecca Black’s song “Friday”. While I myself am not a fan of the song, and understand why that is the majority’s opinion, the hate that Black suffered over the song was tremendous. Of the people who clicked the “like” or “dislike” buttons, 80% decided to dislike – amounting to over 1 million people. And that doesn’t take into account the sheer amount of negative comments she received, both on and off of YouTube. I am definitely of the opinion that options such as “dislike” and “down-vote” buttons should be removed from sites, as I don’t believe they serve any purpose other than to express hate.

Dislikes on Rebecca Black’s “Friday”

Anonymity, however, is not something that can be “fixed” about the Internet. Nor do I believe that there is a realistic way of monitoring the Internet for these negative commentors and reporting or banning them from sites – they will simply create another account. I do believe, though, that there should be more awareness of this issue. Parents should be aware of what their children can and will encounter on the Web, despite how safely they browse. Children and adolescents (heck, even adults) should be prepared for the fact that there are people out there who will write nasty things about them, irrespective of the material they are commenting on. Schools should talk not only about bullying in the halls, but bullying on Facebook and YouTube. And there should be fewer opportunities for Internet bullies to spread their hate, such as with the removal of “dislike” buttons. These things won’t solve the problem, but even if they can help one child or stop one bully, they are worth it. Too many individuals suffer from the actions of Internet bullies, and it’s time the issue was properly addressed.