Anonymity

The transformation of the Internet into an all-seeing electronic marketplace has made it significantly more difficult for users to maintain privacy.  The public is growing more aware of the need for keeping their personal information away from the web’s prying eyes.  They also have higher expectations of knowing how information that’s collected about them is used, and that the technologies that exist to insure anonymity need to be easier for them to use (Kang et al., 2013).  But the self-publishing explosion on the web is also tailor made for its users to disguise their identity.  The public’s ability to hide behind a “handle” or other pseudonym has created a dramatic alternative to the traditional relationship between editorial content and
reader feedback.  A number of journalists have actively advocated for the prohibition of anonymous comments, and a few publications have followed through (Reader, 2012).

There are some strong arguments for why anonymity should not be widespread.  The concept of deindividuation suggests that people withdraw from social norms as anonymity increases.  One of the darker aspects of how anonymity has affected the Internet in general and social media in particular is the rise of “cyber bullying,” and its attendant rise in depression and suicide of its victims, as well as angry and often violent reactions to it (Moore et al., 2012). There is also the "the dark web" that portends another complete existence for the Internet that many will never know - and may never want to know.

However, much of the negativity with anonymity on the Internet comes from the vast number of negative comments posted everywhere on the web by those who have come to be known ignominiously as “trolls” (Bowman, 2011).  Bowman points out that there is some dichotomy in vilifying anonymous comments. That dichotomy is most evident in examinations of how anonymity can be both cursed and blessed in online comments. There are also arguments to encourage anonymity in the workplace, saying that it definitely promotes more productivity when workers believe they can work surveillance-free (Fradera, 2012). For Internet users simply trying to avoid the scrutiny of prying eyes into their buying and browsing habits, there are some valuable resources available. Thanks to privacy visionaries like David Chaum, there are tools like anonymizers that can help users keep a safe distance between them and the sites they visit.  Other tools aid users in exercising control over location-based services that can also be used to identify them.

As for Wikipedia, its larger than life presence as the web’s all-purpose go-to information source, it is also the Internet’s biggest experiment of the influence of anonymous content.  A study done that examined over 100 editors of Wikipedia content concluded that the site it is an excellent model for designers of online communities to insure adequate anonymity and avoid issues of groupthink (Tsikerdekis, 2013).  At the same time, there is evidence that Wikipedia’s anonymity is masking the self-interest of some of its editors, with an offer to peek behind the curtain to see who is actually at the controls.

Julie Ponesse writes, “We are told that anonymity is valuable, and sometimes indispensable, for securing personal information, enhancing liberty and autonomy, and protecting rights to privacy and free speech,” but that it can also “promote the promulgation of hate speech, allow identity thieves to get close to their victims, and enable cyber bullies, trolls, and griefers to behave irresponsibly on the Internet” (p. 321).  So which anonymity happens to be true depends entirely on what a user’s motivation for anonymity happens to be.  It is an inherent contradiction that perhaps goes to the core of what the Internet is.