Anonymity, pseudonymity, or inescapable identity on the net (abstract)
Authors: Johnson Deborah G. , Miller Keith 
Published: November 2005

The first topic of concern is anonymity, specifically the
anonymity that is available in communications on the Internet. An
earlier paper argues that anonymity in electronic communication is
problematic because:
(1) it makes law enforcement difficult (tracking down and
catching on-line law-breakers is difficult when their identity is
unknown);
(2) it frees individuals to behave in socially undesirable and
harmful ways (individuals seem to engage in behavior they wouldn't
engage in if their identity were known);
(3) it diminishes the integrity of information since one can't
be sure who information is coming from, whether it has been altered
on the way, etc.; and (4) all three of the above contribute to an
environment of diminished trust which is not conducive to certain
uses of computer communication.
Counterbalancing these problems are some important benefits.
Anonymity can facilitate some socially desirable and beneficial
behavior. For example, it can eliminate the fear of repercussions
for behavior in contexts in which repercussions would diminish the
availability or reliability of information, e.g., voting, personal
relationships between consenting adults, and the like. Furthermore,
anonymity can be used constructively to reduce the effect of
prejudices on communications. (Gender can be masked, students can
write about professors with candor, and people with disabilities
can participate without stigma, for example.) Negative aspects of
anonymity all seem to point to a tension between accountability and
anonymity. They suggest that accountability and anonymity are not
compatible, and they even seem to suggest that since accountability
is a good thing, it would be good to eliminate anonymity. In other
words, the problems with anonymity suggest that individuals are
more likely to behave in socially desirable ways when they are held
accountable for their behavior (i.e., asked to explain, justify, or
bear the consequences for the behavior), and they are more likely
to engage in socially undesirable behavior when they are not held
accountable. I am not going to take issue with the correlation
between accountability and anonymity, but rather with the claim
that accountability is (always) good.
To examine this problem, let's look at a continuum that
stretches from total anonymity at one end, and no anonymity at all
at the other end. At the opposite extreme of anonymity is a
panopticon society. The panopticon is the prison environment
described by Foucault in which prison cells are arranged in a large
circle with the side facing the inside of the circle open to view.
The guard tower is placed in the middle of the circle so that
guards can see everything that goes on in every cell. In a recent
article on privacy, Jeffrey Reiman, reflecting on the new
intelligent highway systems, suggests that we are moving closer and
closer to a panopticon society.
When we contemplate all the electronic data that is now gathered
about each one of us as we move through our everyday lives-
intelligent highway systems, consumer transactions, traffic
patterns on the internet, medical records, financial records, and
so on- we see the trend that Reiman identifies. Electronic behavior
is recorded and the information is retained. While
actions/transactions in separate domains are not necessarily
combined, it seems obvious that the potential exists for combining
data into a complete portfolio of an individual's day to day (if
not moment to moment) life. So it would seem that as more and more
activities and domains are moved into a IT-based medium, the closer
we will come to a panopticon society.
A panopticon society gives us the ultimate in accountability.
Everything an individual does is observable and therefore available
to those to whom we are accountable.
Of course, in doing this, it puts us, in effect, in prison. The
prison parallel is appropriate here because what anonymity allows
us is freedom; prison is the ultimate in lack of freedom. In this
way the arguments for a free society (and for democracy) become
arguments for anonymity. Only when individuals are free will they
experiment, try new ideas, take risks, and learn by doing so. Only
in an environment that tolerates making mistakes will individuals
develop the active habits that are so essential for democracy.
In a world without information technology, individuals have
levels or degrees and various kinds of anonymity and consequently
different levels and kinds of freedom. Degrees and kinds of
anonymity vary with the domain: small town social life versus urban
social life, voting, commercial exchanges, banking, automobile
travel, airplane travel, telephone communication, education, and so
on.
Drawing from our experience before IT-based institutions, we
might believe that what we need is varying levels or degrees and
kinds of anonymity. This seems a good starting place because it
suggests an attempt to re-create the mixture that we have in the
physical, non-IT-based world.
Nevertheless, there is a danger. If we think in terms of levels
and degrees of anonymity, we may not see the forest from the trees.
We may not acknowledge that in an electronic medium, levels and
kinds of anonymity mean, in an important sense, no anonymity. If
there are domains in which we can be anonymous but those domains
are part of a global communication infrastructure in which there is
no anonymity at the entry point, then it will always be possible to
trace someone's identity.
We delude ourselves when we think we have anonymity on-line or
off-line. Rather, what we have both places is situations in which
it is more and less difficult to identify individuals.
We have a continuum of situations in which it is easy and
difficult to link behavior to other behavior and histories of
behaviors. In the physical world, we can go places and do things
where others don't know us by name and have no history with us,
though they see our bodies, clothes, and behavior. If we do nothing
unusual, we may be forgotten. On the other hand, if we do something
illegal (or socially undesirable), authorities may attempt to track
us down and figure out who we are. For example, law enforcement
officials, collection agencies, those who want to sue us may take
an active interest in removing our anonymity, ex post facto. Think
of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols-the men who apparently bombed
the federal building in Oklahoma City. Much of what they did, they
did anonymously, but then law enforcement officials set out to find
out who had done various things, e.g., rented a car, bought
explosives, etc. The shrouds of anonymity under which McVeigh and
Nichols had acted were slowly removed.
Is this any different than behavior on the internet? Is there a
significant difference in the kind or degree of anonymity we have
in the physical world versus what we have in an IT-based world? The
character of the trail we leave is different; in the one case, its
an electronic trail; while in the other it involves human memories,
photographs, and paper and ink. What law enforcement officials had
to do to track down McVeigh is quite different from tracking down
an electronic law breaker. Also, the cost of electronic information
gathering, both in time and money, can be dramatically lower than
the cost of talking to people, gathering physical evidence, and the
other minutia required by traditional detective work.
We should acknowledge that we do not and are never likely to
have anonymity on the Internet. We would do better to think of
different levels or kinds of identity. There are important moral
and social issues arising as a result of these varying degrees and
kinds of identity. Perhaps the most important matter is assuring
that individuals are informed about the conditions in which they
are interacting. Perhaps, even more important is that individuals
have a choice about the conditions under which they are
communicating.
In the rest of this paper we explore a few examples of levels
and kinds of identity that are (or could be) practical on the
Internet. We discuss the advantages and disadvantages that we see
for these "styles" of identity for individuals, and we examine the
costs and benefits of these styles for society as a whole.