How Important is Online Anonymity?

In our contemporary online world of social media, it has become common practice for people to broadcast personal details of their daily lives. We voluntarily put all of this information out there on public networks for any and all to see. There is certain value in sharing and, after all, if you are not doing anything wrong you should have nothing to hide, right?

In a new piece written for the MIT Technology Review titled “Why the World Needs Anonymous” digital anthropologist Gabriella Coleman states that there is a growing voice against online anonymity. Many are now arguing that it encourages trolling and untrustworthiness. In fact, a number of online news sources have ended anonymous comment sections on their websites over such concerns. There is also a point to be made that online anonymity can hide criminal activity. Take for example the recent bust of 400 Tor-anonymized domains as part of the Silk Road 2.0 online drug trade.

But is there also some value in anonymity? As our world, both online and off, becomes increasingly surveilled by CCTV cameras, NSA spying, and corporate data mining, we seem to be living in what Michel Foucault conceptualized as the Panopticon. Many of our daily activities are now tracked, recorded, and stored in databases. We can be monitored at any time whether we are aware of it or not.

One group is fighting back against these changes. The appropriately named Anonymous collective has modeled itself as the very embodiment of this spirit. This online movement is made up of tens of thousands of individuals from across the globe who anonymously or pseudononymously engage in protests under the collective identity of Anonymous. As Vanessa Grigoriadis pointed out, they are in principle the polar opposite of Facebook, what some call “radical opacity.”

Since 2006, Anonymous has become infamous for its online protests against censorship and oppression. They engage in what is known as ‘hacktivism,’ which is the use of computer hacking techniques for the purpose of political activism. While some may think of Anonymous as merely a chaotic gathering of teenage trolls and pranksters, Dr. Coleman and others argue that there are important ethical lessons we can derive from their example.

“Anonymous may strike a reader as unique, but its efforts represent just the latest in experimentation with anonymous speech as a conduit for political expression. Anonymous expression has been foundational to our political culture, characterizing monumental declarations like the Federalist Papers, and the Supreme Court has repeatedly granted anonymous speech First Amendment protection,” writes Coleman.

Indeed, privacy and anonymity are perhaps more important than ever in our modern panoptic society. Without it, dissenting opinions, controversial research, protests, and whistleblowing, all of which are crucial for democracy, could be seriously limited. According to Coleman, “just as anonymity can engender disruptive and antisocial behavior such as trolling, it can provide a means of pushing back against increased surveillance.” To learn more about Anonymous, you can read my paper “Digital Contention: Anonymous and the Freedom of Information Movement.” I also recommend Dr. Coleman’s brand new book “Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous” and Laura Poitras’ new documentary film on Edward Snowden Citizenfour.