Draft Internet anonymity legislation would place burdens upon New York-based website owners, forcing them to delete any anonymous posts that other Internet users have indicated are instances of cyberbullying.
If the bills pass, any Internet user would have the right to phone a toll-free number that websites which the owner would be required to set up to handle such grievances. Anonymous web users would then have to reveal their name and address, or else their post must be deleted within 48 hours. The legislation says, in part:
“A web site administrator, upon request, shall remove any comments posted on his or her web site by an anonymous poster unless such anonymous poster agrees to attach his or her name to the post and confirms that his or her IP address, legal name and home address are accurate.”
So many problems with this, primarily the toll-free number. A government shouldn’t be able to force bloggers to pay for and manage such a service. And what if you don’t answer the call?
A second problem is that, once identified as cyber-bullying, it is hard to imagine a single poster, who previously chose to be anonymous, to provide their full details.
And what about anonymous posters who do not leave an email address – how will they be contacted?
And what if it is a site that nobody ever visits? A more reasonable legislation would make a distinction between popular or influential sites, and those that are insignificant. For example, the New York Times should be held accountable for all content on their site, and should have checks and balances in place.
The Future
I can foresee a split internet. It could evolve organically via voluntary codes of conduct. Or via legislation, but that will be much more difficult to get right. But eventually we might have three parallel Internets.
Legit Web: All websites that strictly follow laws and guidelines. Larger and official sites will be compelled to comply. Visitors can trust that these sites do everything properly, and there will be a new symbol in the browser like the padlock symbol. The compliance will be built in to tools available to purchase from 3rd parties, just like the security certificates of today. For commenting, logging in using Facebook Connect and OpenID will become ubiquitous.
Grey Web: Mostly smaller sites and those based in non-English-speaking countries. While they don’t comply with the evolved standards, they are typically benign and legal. If there is a case like cyber-bullying, resolution will require court orders.
Dark Web: Not easily accessible, and similar to the BitTorrent, Tor and Onion Routing. But for people who wish, there will be a way of flying under the radar.
