Advantages And Disadvantages Of Anonymity

In the essay Where Anonymity Breeds Contempt, by Julie Zhou, her thesis is “But the law by itself cannot do enough to disarm the internet’s trolls. Content providers, social network platforms and community sites must also do their part by rethinking the systems they have in place, for user commentary so as to discourage- or disallow- anonymity.” Zhou’s thesis is located in the first two sentences of paragraph nine, on page 89. 2. The issue Zhou addresses in this essay is trolling on the internet.

While identity theft was present in society previous to the appearance of the internet, this medium has provided thieves with an intriguing method to steal identities from people without even having to leave their house. "Today, more and more people engage in online financial activities such as shopping, banking, investing, and bill paying." (Understanding Identity Theft) While this reflects positively on people's lives by saving them significant time, it also exposes them to a world of

There are many dangers happening in the online world that a lot of people don’t know about. In some cases, you hear on the news that ‘a girl’s online harasser kidnapped her’ or something else along those lines. For those reason in particular, it would

Internet: Lack of Credibility, bad news, has become a big problem for privacy and often used for criminal acts.

In the age of cutting edge technology such as the world in which we live, easily obtainable information has turned out to be a mainstay in society. The days of instant-gratification are upon us and waiting for any length of time since the advent of the Internet has become unacceptable in the technological arena. Because information is so easily available, this gives pause to security and privacy of personal identifiable information. With headlines screaming Identity Theft the disadvantages are clear. No longer can users post whatever they are thinking, doing, wearing, etc. without the profound knowledge that each post is forever solidified forever on the World Wide Web for anyone with an Internet connection to access. Those with less technological knowledge have yet to grasp this concept and this unfortunately has caused harm to their personal lives and professional careers, in some cases.

The Internet is full of endless information that is easily available at our fingertips. There are advantages and disadvantages to having access to such easily obtainable information. One advantage would be the ability to acquire more knowledge by having access to information outside of a classroom or seminar. Gaining this information can help with school or work projects if you are able to find helpful information. It is also a quick and convenient method of gathering data. An example of how it might help an everyday citizen would be if a person were thinking of moving to a new city or area, they could check the crime rates and frequency and look to see if any sex offenders are in the area. This is a good way to keep your family safe by using the easily obtainable information on the Internet. Some disadvantages of easily obtainable information is it may not be credible. Just because information is on the Internet, does not

“Dragnet Nation” author Julia Angwin and Bruce Wayne are surprisingly similar. Both have struggles with keeping private life private, dealing with baddies, and being a bit paranoid. However, unlike Batman, “Dragnet Nation” isn’t groundbreaking. Yet despite stating obvious facts, and doing more to entice paranoia than inform, Angwin does have a solid underlying point: They key to online privacy is pseudonymity. Providing false information in order to protect oneself and others, is quite simple to apply, and can deter social engineering attacks. Be that as it may, pseudonymity can be used for less noble purposes.

However, this ability for anonymity within an online community doesn’t necessarily mean privacy. The study Internet social network communities: Risk taking, trust, and privacy concerns by Fogel and Nehmad (2008) talks about how much university students are willing to share on social media. Although the study does strictly look at one set of university students, it gives an example of how much individuals are willing to share personal information such as pictures of oneself, ones’ email address, instant messenger address,

The words, “Arguing that you don’t care about privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say” were said by Edward Snowden who is a computer professional in America. Similarly, the essays “Tracking Is an Assault on Liberty,” “Web Users Get as Much as They Give,” and “Facebook Is Using You” from Nicholas Carr, Jim Harper, and Lori Andrews respectively points out that the internet privacy is good and bad. However, the articles by Carr and Andrews are based on the negative side of the internet privacy, which means that the internet privacy is not good. On the other hand, Harper’s article is based on the positive side of the internet privacy, which means that the internet privacy is good and scary, but people need to be careful of their own information and browsing histories, and websites. Jim Harper’s essay is more relevant and reasonable than the Nicholas Carr and Lori Andrews’s essays. However, Harper seems more persuasive to readers because he believes that the internet is good if people use it in a right way, whereas Carr and Andrews believe that the internet is not good at all.

Throughout time, privacy and security have been two heavily debated topics. There has always been a struggle to find middle ground between a private environment and a secure environment, but the dawn of technology and the Internet has made this struggle even more difficult. The Internet has drastically decreased the expectation of privacy of any and all individuals that have ever used it. Technology in general can pose a threat to an individual’s physical and virtual security. The Internet has also brought forth a sense of anonymity to those looking to conceal their true identities, some of which plan to commit horrific crimes. Privacy and security go hand in hand, however security is by far the most important.

The agencies employed by governments to police the web in order to protect the vulnerable have seen an increase in child pornography and online fraud. The speed at which information can be distributed and the number of people that can be reached attracts those that are intent on causing harm. The term “cybercrime” is becoming more widely used. The financial gains that can be made and the anonymity the internet can provide, make the virtual world of cyberspace a haven for criminals. Although the internet has huge benefits for information gathering and social networking, in the wrong hands it can cause harm to the vulnerable and criminals are able to vanish into the underground with the use of false identities that are hard to track online.

In relation to privacy, social networking and many other genres of the internet are one of the main and easiest places to track down people, many naïve victims, posts up their details on their profile, making it easy to enable stalkers or strangers to have advantage of virtually meeting you. This problem has caused many families to live in fear, not knowing how vulnerable they are to the outside world, where

Internet privacy is the security of a user’s personal data that is stored or published on the internet. The internet is an important part of every individual’s daily life. In today’s society, the internet is used by many different people for many reasons. It can be used for research, communication, and purchasing items. Without the internet, many things that are completed during the course of a day would be impossible or take time to complete. As people use the internet, everything is stored in a database that tracks and keeps any personal information that is entered by users. As users continue to use the internet to complete important tasks such as purchasing items and paying bills, their privacy and security become at risk. Although the internet can be seen to have a positive impact on society, it does have a negative impact. Since the internet can be accessed by anybody it can cause a lot of damage. Examples of internet risk include identity thieves, phasing, and scams. Due to things such as online shopping, banking and other e-commerce options, personal information is stored in the internet enabling many cybercrimes to occur. Cybercrimes are very similar to any regular crime; the crime just happens to take place on websites for criminals to hack and steal user’s information for their own personal benefit. Cybercriminals tend to attack users based on their emails, social media accounts, and web history because the most history about an individual is stored in those sites.

In today’s world, we are all in some way connected to or involved with the internet. We all use different services that we feel either enrich our lives or make them more enjoyable every day, from email to FaceBook, MySpace, and e-commerce. We all take a sort of false comfort in the basic anonymity of the internet; however, when we think about it, that could end up being the single biggest risk to our own safety today. When we typically think of crimes committed against us, we could probably name several: mugging, theft, scams, murder, and rape. For these, things we all take as many necessary steps as we can to help lower the chances of them happening to us because they are on the forefront of our minds. However, most of us don’t take the

Cyberspace is a non-physical environment created by computers interoperating on a network. People can interact in ways that are similar to reality, but does not require physical movement beyond typing. Advanced technology established this parallel world, ‘cyberspace’. This can be convenient for people to chat, shop, share, explore or research online, but it can also be a disadvantage at the same time. The prime examples of the disadvantages are, people are able to create fake, imaginative identities and use it to abuse others and this can lead to serious issues, such as sexual abuse or child grooming; and since, the Internet can be recognised as a parallel world to reality, this discourages people to have face-to-face human interaction. Consequently, cyberspace can be harmful to all people, because there are hardly any restrictions on the Internet. Technology inaugurated this and it is having an inimical influence on the majority of people who have access to the Internet on a daily basis.