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What if Everyone Knew Who You Really Were on the Internet

Let’s say the internet gets so bad that it becomes almost impossible to carry on a civilized conversation on a social network or to avoid a flood of anonymous emails. The people become fed up and can’t take it anymore. A revolution takes place and a miracle happens: every one is required to get a real id that can be traced back an actual person. This id is then required to do anything on the internet.

How many people are going to still post death threats, character assassinations, or make racist or sexist comments. How many people are are going to email you saying they’re a Nigerian prince that wants to give you money. It would sure go a long way to cleaning up some of the cesspools that make up social networking and the garbage pit that is email today.

Knowing who you are cuts both ways. A woman trying to hide from an abusive boyfriend or husband would want to keep her identity unknown. People facing political persecution would like to keep a low profile.

Perhaps the biggest hurdle to setting up ids would be verification. How do you prove someone is who they say they are when documents can be easily forged and fake identities created. You could use finger prints or eye scans, but the effort to set up the infrastructure to do so would be massive.

Then there is the issue of maintaining the information in a safe and secure manner. We couldn’t rely on any countries government. They wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation to use it to track people. It would have to be an independent agency.

Is setting up such a system unfeasible? Even if all the hurdles could be overcome and a real id system could be created, is that something we would want? Are we better off with the way it is today and just live with its ills or relying on mods and spam filters to keep thing somewhat under control.

I’m aware that Web 3.0 is making strides in this area. It remains to be seen if it will be viable.

Can_Utility ,
@Can_Utility@beehaw.org avatar

Fifteen to 20 years ago many people thought that the anonymity of the internet provided a permission structure for people to act incivilly. But if anything, the rise of social media has disproven that. People post the most incredibly toxic shit on Facebook or Twitter, often under their own names, right now. It’s not the relative anonymity, or lack thereof, that dissuades people from toxic behavior. It’s a collective action problem that rewards whatever the community (however defined) doesn’t rise up to stamp out.

Require a real ID (which sounds vaguely Orwellian where it doesn’t sound nebulous) and you’ll still get Ben Shapiro and Steven Crowder and your uncle yelling transphobic trash on Twitter and Facebook and elsewhere. Places like Reddit and the fediverse are rapidly becoming outliers.

And as pointed out in OP, requiring all accounts tied to an identifiable person would be a disaster for people in abusive relationships, or who have a stalker, or other endangered persons. (Thinking back to Google Buzz and the ways it enabled online harassment and abuse before Google mercifully cut it showrt.)

The current, semi-anonymous, system is possibly the worst system devised, with the possible exception of all the others. No system is going to solve a collective-action problem. We, the collective, have to step up and fix it ourself.

(My understanding of Web 3.0 is limited to the crypto space, which seems inherently scammy; if there’s more to it than that, and I should be aware of it, I’d love to be educated.)

PotentiallyAnApricot ,

The anonymity of the internet is a huge part of its vibrance. There are a lot of people who cannot feel completely safe or act authentically using their real name, or who simply have insecurities, who have thrived in online spaces where they could explore and express themselves and create and connect in ways they couldn’t offline. People writing fiction, making art, trying on new ways of being, exploring information or interests that they can’t get/be seen reading about in repressive households, making friendships outside of their social group or religion, doing “embarassing” stuff that is really just ‘having a hobby’, pouring out their feelings in a way they can’t with people they know, etc. Anonymity (if we can really call it that) online is so important to self expression and creativity. I think that an Internet where everyone has to put their legal name next to everything they do would be a sad, boring, negative place indeed. Like….facebook. You gotta protect that weirdness and humanity. The regular, identifiable world isn’t safe for humanity or for weirdness, or queerness, or survivors, activists, or people who are marginalized in any way. I don’t feel comfortable when I’m being watched. I’m not that creative or cool or interesting or nice when i feel self conscious. I think that goes for most people.

Kaldo ,

It’s hard to say since there are major security issues with that. I think it’d be better if we weren’t anonymous but we’re not really ‘there’ yet mentally and culturally and it’d be used for nefarious purposes.

I do often wish I knew who I was talking to for real because I’d have vastly different behavior if I’m talking to a 15 year old kid, a 30 year old redneck or a 50 year old doctor for example.

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