Musings & Rambles

A bill has finally been presented in Ottawa that will provide for a tougher crack-down on cyber bullies, specifically related to the distribution of intimate images without the victim’s consent. This comes just over a year after the death of local teen, Amanda Todd, who commit suicide after pictures of her were distributed online. The legislation, titled the Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, proposes to make the sharing and distribution of intimate images illegal, chargeable with up to 5 years in jail. The bill will also allow judges to charge convicts with the costs of removing these images from the internet, and give them the ability to sign warrants that will allow police to seize electronic devices for investigation. While the bill still needs to be passed, it marks a huge step in the crack-down on cyber bullying.

However, not all agree with the proposed bill. Many argue that the bill, depicted as a way to help teens like Amanda Todd, is simply an attack on Canadian’s civil liberties by including in the bill all “theft of telecommunications”, including stealing cable & Wi-Fi. These individuals also argue that the legislation is too broad, and does not provide a clear enough definition of when it is or isn’t a crime – pointing to examples such as images from parties, posted to social media with no malicious intent. In other words, many believe the bill is being proposed as one thing, but in reality is another.

In my opinion, I think any step towards better handling of cyber bullying is a step in the right direction. The other things included in the bill? Well, they were already illegal (such as stealing cable, or hacking into someone’s computer), now they will just be easier to catch, and I think that’s what has people so worked up. We have come to expect that we can get away with these things – we see them as our rights, when they never truly have been. BUT, back on track! Cyber bullying. It’s a horrible thing that hurts so many individuals (not just teens), and is so much harder to catch than traditional bullying; so, I believe Bill C-13 is a fantastic step in the right direction. It’s a step that allows for authorities to expose those who have hidden behind the veil of a computer, and provide punishments that will (in some small way) help those who have been hurt by the actions of the individual.

Sources

1. http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Simons+cyber+bullying+bill+threaten+civil+liberties/9192160/story.html
2. http://london.ctvnews.ca/legislation-will-crack-down-on-cyber-crime-1.1552632
3. http://www.news1130.com/2013/11/20/mother-of-amanda-todd-welcomes-anti-cyber-bullying-bill/

While cyber protection is unquestionably provided for a state’s government, law enforcement agencies, and other important corporations, NGOs appear to have been largely left out of the equation. I would argue that these organizations are in dire need of online protection, not simply for the protection of the organizations themselves, but for the protection of those whom the organization works with and on behalf of. For example, a skilled attacker could easily obtain the information of an NGOs donors, volunteers, and clients, as well as information on their operations which could lead to potential physical harm to individuals. One need only think of human rights and humanitarian organizations, often operating in war-torn countries, to imagine which types of threats the release of said information could lead to.

Cyber attacks can also be used against NGOs to prevent sensitive information from being released that implicate a state/government/group/etc. in some atrocity. For example, in 2010, various NGOs in West Papua were victims of DDoS attacks on their websites after posting a video of Indonesian soldiers torturing West Papuans. It was suspected that the Indonesian authorities were the perpetrators of the attack, which left several websites inactive for some time. This is a prime example of an entity (ex. – Indonesian authorities) dishing out the funds and technology in order to act against another entity (ex. – NGO) who has little ability to prevent the action. In the case of NGOs, it is often the “bad guy” who has the ability to stamp out the “good guy”, and I think it should be the other way around. Ideally, it would be fantastic to have an organization that specialized in the cyber protection of NGOs websites and online information, providing them with the same or a higher level of cyber technology as those who might aim to suppress them. Of course, realistically implementing such an initiative, providing an expensive service to mostly non-profit, donations-based organizations, would be a feat that most would laugh at.

Perhaps someone should pitch the idea to Bill Gates.

Sources

1. http://westpapuamedia.info/2010/11/05/indonesian-authorities-suspected-of-launching-cyber-attacks-on-ngo-websites/
2. http://www.theguardian.com/society/2010/oct/28/survival-international-website-torture-video

I think Ava makes a great point in this blog post. As much as we like to imagine the Internet brings folks together, it also acts like a wedge in our online society. Where matters were previously debated in person, typically in one session of words thrown back and forth until an agreement or a stalemate was decided upon, debates online prove to be a lot more complicated. People post comments directed at an individual’s opinion, usually in disagreement, but then often leave their keyboard, with some feeling of satisfaction at having “beaten down” the other. The initial individual may respond again, at an attempt to carry on debate, but the chance of a further response is just that, chance. There’s a disconnect from the foundations of debate. The Internet allows people to puff out their chest, state their opinion loudly, and then walk in and out of the room at will – participating in debate only when it suits them – as opposed to sitting down and carrying on a conversation with courtesy and a healthy back-and-forth. Rather than using evidence and logic, the Internet is rife with nonsensical statements & opinions from those who have not educated themselves, but feel secure in shouting out an opinion because they are behind a computer screen. If people acted like they do online, in real life, it would seem absolutely ridiculous:

Ranting aside, I think the Internet can be a great platform for people to debate and discuss their opinions where they might be too shy to, otherwise. However, it also provides this sense of “anonymity” that results in people getting a little out of hand when stating their opinions and disagreements. The idea of a “debate” becomes a little lost, and discussions end up looking more like a shouting match between individuals who won’t even attempt to find a middle ground. In the end, the ideological divide simply gets larger.

The days of braving the mobs of deal-crazed shoppers on Black Friday or Boxing Day may soon be over. BBC reported that Chinese citizens spent today online shopping, consuming more than on any other day of the year, on what’s become known as Cyber Monday. Chinese companies slashed their online prices by 50% or more, but raked in $5.7 billion in total sales. In order to accommodate the millions of shoppers, 20,000 computer servers were required to handle online traffic.

To me, this sounds like trying to fit millions of people into a shopping mall. The demand is greater than the capacity; except, we’re talking about the internet. And it’s troublesome in two ways. One, we are barely able to handle the online surges that days like Cyber Monday induce, our servers simply aren’t powerful enough (yet). And two, our ability to (despite the technological barriers) amass so many people onto a website that then has to ship products through traditional means causes some dilemmas. Is it realistic to expect FedEx to ship 22 million packages in a single day? I think this is a prime example of both the restrictions of our current technology, as well as the issues that even such “limited” technology can produce for non-technological things. Though, I don’t think anyone would argue that the internet doesn’t benefit the economy! E-sales on Cyber Monday way out-do e-sales on Black Friday – a much older and well-known shopping-day.

Sources:

1. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24894562

2. http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/23/pf/fedex-cyber-monday/index.html?iid=EL

3. http://money.cnn.com/2013/11/10/news/economy/china-cyber-monday/

4. http://business.time.com/2012/11/26/black-friday-results-are-in-centerpiece-of-a-huge-multi-day-bricks-and-clicks-shopping-spree/

Recently Canada was accused of spying on Brazil’s mining and energy activities, but should we be surprised?

Countries spy on, and are accused of spying on each other all the time, it’s part of the modern age and how states are able to stay afloat. But, is this something that should cause alarm? I say, no. Why? Because spies and political espionage go back farther than almost anything else in our political system, and cyber spies are only the latest model. It’s not a new phenomenon.

Now, does this mean we should embrace cyber espionage? No. It is handled with the same severity as traditional espionage was 50, 100, or 1000 years ago – as it should be. Sovereign states have a right to their privacy and a right to be miffed when it’s infringed upon. So, they call out the suspected state and go through the well-rehearsed game of politics, and life moves on.

And it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what compelled Canada to spy in the first place: oil, money, energy in a world that’s rapidly running dry. If, through cyber espionage, Canada could gain valuable information on Brazil, it would provide them with an upper hand in getting in on some of the action. Especially when Brazil was auctioning off the rights to help properly exploit a huge resource.

On the other hand, access to Brazil’s computers could also give Canada the information required to make the decision not to participate in auctions – as it appears was the case (for reasons unknown). Perhaps this is what tipped off the Brazilians to the espionage. With an oil discovery so big, Brazil had expected at least 40 companies worldwide to auction for a shot at the contract; but only 11 signed up, with not a single company from the U.S., U.K., Canada, New Zealand or Australia. In other words, Canada and the countries that regularly meet with Canada to discuss security & energy threats did not bid – a decision they would not have made without good reason (aka. private information obtained through espionage).

It is my opinion, however, that this “cyber” espionage could and would have occurred if the Internet did not exist. One need only look to a Dictionary for evidence of this. First known use of the term spy: 1200’s. First origins of the Internet: 1960s.

____________________________________

Sources:

1. http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/TV+Shows/The+National/ID/2411192763/

2. http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/why-would-canada-spy-on-brazil-mining-and-energy-officials-1.1931465

3. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/spy

4. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/internet

According to a Globe and Mail article from earlier this year, a Montreal-based company called Canipre has begun collecting evidence on over 1 million Canadians who illegally download. Caipre, an anti-piracy enforcement company that provides forensic services to copyright-holders within Canada, even had one of its clients before Federal Court requesting over 1000 IP addresses that will allow them to identify illegal downloaders of their content. It should come as no surprise that this client happens to be a powerful American movie studio, requesting information from an Ontario-based service-provider. But does this mean Canada’s cracking down in terms of illegal downloads?

Copyright cases such as these occur often in the States, this is a new chapter for Canada. While Americans can be fined for huge amounts of money, the recently-passed Bill C-11 restricts the fines for Canadians to a maximum of $5000. This was implemented specifically so the Canadian courts would not become bogged-down with thousands of copyright infringement cases. Some argue that Canada simply doesn’t have the culture for such litigation. However, Canadians do view the illegality of copyright infringement very lightly.

This brings into question whether, through measures such as Bill C-11, we are almost promoting or allowing Canadians to continue illegal downloads, despite the actions of companies such as Caipre (who, I might add, struggle in court). There are penalties, but very small ones, and the odds that you will have to face these consequences is slim. Studies show that Canada is 4th in the world for most illegal downloads of music, but on a per capita basis, we beat out the top 3. This means that on a personal level, the average Canadian downloads almost 2.5x more music than the average American. This has lead to American pressure on Canada to toughen up and change it’s approach. But Canada hasn’t, and continues to allow illegal downloads of not just music, but all types of digital content. Companies such as Caipre simply can’t compete with the embedded culture of tolerance in Canada.

Sources

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/technology/tech-news/anti-piracy-firm-targeting-canadians-who-download-illegally/article11877622/

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2012/09/20/music-piracy-canada-top-countries_n_1899752.html

This post is in response to the blog post “Are Facebook Friends Really Friends” (https://blogs.ubc.ca/hollybishu/2013/10/03/are-facebook-friends-really-friends/).

In the aforementioned post it is argued that our current era of social media communication, Facebook “friend-ing” in particular, has damaged how we view friendship – and I would have to say that I wholeheartedly agree. I can count on both hands the amount of people I consider true friends – those who I invest time and energy into – yet I have 337 “friends” on Facebook. I barely communicate with any of them; however, when my mom asks me how “so-in-so” is doing from high school, or whether “what’s-his-name” still has a girlfriend, I usually have a pretty detailed response. Why? Because this “friend-ing” of people through Facebook or other social media allows us to peer into the lives of those who we otherwise don’t give the time of day. By being their “friend”, we can browse through their photos, read their posts, and see what others say to them – all without more effort than your hands sweeping over keyboard and mouse. It is both endearingly and creepily referred to as “Facebook stalking”, a term I would like to linger on for just a moment.

I can’t help but notice the parallels between “Facebook stalking” and other online forms of intelligence that we hear about so often. What makes our “stalking” any different from that of the government? Does “friend-ing” someone give us permission to perform this act, despite the fact that it is only a click of a button? We perform the very task that we protest against and cringe at the thought of. We use social media and the term friend as a way to “creep” on people, rather than putting in the effort to truly know them. We’ve turned our social life into a type of slacktivism with a side of creepy. We feel as if our “stalking” isn’t wrong because we’re “friends” with the person on Facebook, even if part of (or the entire) reason we “friend” them is simply to stalk and not to communicate. In an era where even civilians peer into the online lives of other civilians (real-world friends or not), how can we expect the government not to partake as well?

Food for thought. Perhaps these are just the late night ramblings of one who has noticed her own “Facebook stalking” ways.

If you saw this post’s title and immediately started singing “video killed the radio star”, you’re on the right track! Except, today, those who “killed the radio star” are now being killed by internet stars (metaphorically, of course!).

It is becoming increasingly more evident that internet videos, those on YouTube in particular, are replacing the entertainment void that was previously quelled by a dose of Saturday morning ‘toons.  In fact, there are even channels on YouTube that provide cartoons for children, uploaded every Saturday morning. But what’s great about YouTube is that, with 100 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute, there is always a video to fit your entertainment needs. You can watch anything, from beauty how-to’s, daily vlogs, gaming commentary, or music videos (to name a few), and there is endless variety within even those specific categories. According to YouTube Statistics, “YouTube reaches more US adults ages 18-34 than any cable network”, with more than 6 billion hours of video watched each month.

Another fantastic benefit of this TV to Internet transition is the opportunity it has provided for so many people to do what they love, and share it with the world. If you can sing, dance, cook, craft, etc., upload some footage of your killer skills and the people will flock. Heck, you can even make a living out of it, all whilst having fun and providing free entertainment for the world to see. Currently, there are thousands of video creators on YouTube that earn six figures or more each year, and many have been given even more opportunities through their success. Some have appeared on talk shows, interviewed celebrities (even as big as One Direction), or even earned Guinness World record titles (the actual Internet Killed Television channel earned a record for most consecutive daily videos uploaded, currently over 1600 days)!

And while we won’t be seeing the end of TV any time soon, the worlds of TV and Internet-dome are definitely colliding. For example, celebrity judge and music producer Simon Cowell has recently launched the You Generation, a global YouTube talent search, not just in the categories of song and dance, but in any category! The idea is to help the average-Joe get noticed in the mass of videos on YouTube, and give them their boost to success. So far, many of YouTube’s current “celebrities” have worked together with Cowell to advertise and carry out the project. Entertainment is definitely taking a turn in an exciting new direction!

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.