Does Identity affect crime online?

The internet has removed many of the political and economical restraints that limit the expression of ideas in more traditional mediums. One attraction of the internet is the level of anonymity the architecture affords its users. The main argument for greater regulation lies in the undeniable growth in ‘cyber crime’, much of which is facilitated by the degree of anonymity users enjoy online. Lawrence Lessig’s ideas of regulation and the online environment will be used to assess the impact identity can have in the online department, and how this affects the nature of crime online. This will be done by theoretically assessing how an internet architecture that enables total anonymity would affect criminal behaviour online. Then an architecture that requires full identification will be contrasted. It will become clear from the affect that such polemic online architectures in relation to identity have, to user behaviour online that the fundamental nature of many types of cyber crime can be best explained with reference to identity.
Any study of online crime and regulation would not be complete without reference to the numerous works of Lawrence Lessig. This study will utilise his ideas on the four constraints which affect regulation on the internet. These are described as laws, social norms, the market, and the actual code of the internet (or its architecture). It is the latter’s importance which Lessig places most emphasis on, as he believes this can be altered to reflect any values so chosen. Based on this claim, this study will take the approach of assessing the benefits and disadvantages of different theoretical internet architectures in order to understand the affect that identity on user’s online behaviour. Such theoretical assessment will answer the question of whether anonymity, identity or more importantly the lack of identity affects crime online.
If the architecture of the internet allowed the choice of total anonymity in all its online functions, it would fulfil the libertarian view of how the internet should be used. The obvious benefits of online anonymity is the removal of inhibitions it allows its users. This enables the ‘perfect freedom of the internet’ and encourages the creativity and free-sharing culture that many feel the internet was founded upon. If anonymous, a user will not feel the usual social inhibitions that could prevent him commenting on topics which are either censored, such as political, or that have social stigma attached to them. They will not fear the economic, physical or social reprimand that usually accompanies such comments. Indeed, anonymity is a “blessing for political dissidents, corporate whistle-blowers, participants in online therapy. The political ramifications of anonymity were highlighted numerous US cases, in which the court felt the democratic foray of the internet would be stifled if it did not allow anonymity, and that removing it would be to remove user’s “shield from tyranny of the majority”. An anonymous internet clearly has its benefits, and this fluidity of identity is for some its most attractive feature. Anonymity is capable of removing inhibitions that hinder development, discussion and creativity, as well as erasing prejudices based on identity.
However, these benefits are inevitably accompanied by a number of drawbacks. Rowland talks of this loss of inhibitions but in a negative, more realistic perspective. Many social psychologists have concluded that anonymity can contribute to ‘deindividuation’, “a state of loss of self-awareness, lowered social inhibitions and increased impulsivity”. Whilst the benefits of such a state have been highlighted, anonymity can also clearly lead to anti-social behavior, allowing prejudices to flourish rather than erasing them. Civil offences are more likely, with anonymous defamation cases rife on the internet. Perhaps the largest social concern about the internet is the protection of children, as anonymity means the architecture cannot discern between minors and adults when providing ‘adult’ content. Even more serious is the threat that anonymity could be aiding criminal activities on the internet, or ‘cyber crime’. Take for example the Home Office Cyber crime Report as indicative of the general trend in online crime. The top three general concerns were pedophilic activity, fraud and espionage. It is obvious that these three, and any illegal activity committed online is considerably less likely to be prosecuted if the architecture allows every user to act anonymously. The idea of anonymity as a facilitator of crime online is further supported cryptography, steganography and anonymous remby the Home Office report findings about technologies which assist crime. Items such as anonymous e-mailers, cryptography and peer-to-peer software were highlighted, all of which function by enabling anonymity. It seems that online anonymity both encourages behavior which would be unacceptable in the ‘offline world’, and facilitates consequence free activity, while disabling the ability for society and government to protect minors from inappropriate content. This behavior is clearly only the actions of the minority, but an architecture that enables complete online anonymity make identifying those responsible for their online actions impossible, and any form of regulation ineffective.
At the other end of the spectrum of regulation lies an architecture that would require full identification before users can access the internet and its content. Considering the effects of such a theoretical architecture allows insight into how identity affects crime online. In direct response to the problems of enabling anonymity outlined earlier, such identification would enable full consequences of any online action to be reattached to the consequence of the parallel action in the ‘real world’. Civil or criminal actions online could be properly policed more effectively, as prosecutions would be more successful. Not only this, but the architecture would not allow the user to avoid regulation through social norms. The process of ‘deindividuation’ would not occur as user’s identity would be known to their ISP’s. Anti-social behavior online will often not be tolerated by ones online peers, who will either condemn it or contact administrators to remove the offender. Indeed, if ones identity had to be attached to all online activity, the user could risk being blocked from large segments of the internet by co-operative ISP’s or websites when notified by fellow users. In essence this theoretical environment would be the ideal solution to the problem of cyber crime, following the positivist interpretation of cyber crime simply as a technical problem with a technical solution. Indeed, such an approach does seem compatible with Lessig’s emphasis on the key influencing factor in online regulation being the architecture of the internet itself.
The ability for users to interact with the online without identifying themselves is clearly a hugely significant factor which underpins the current architecture of the World Wide Web. The previous polemic examples in which the architecture contrasts based solely on the ability or inability to identify users demonstrates precisely this importance’s. In the later example, which is much further from the reality than a completely anonymous online environment, would essentially bring the ‘cyber realm’ much closer to the offline realities. Law enforcement would certainly be significantly easier. Referring to the classical interpretation of crime, the opportunities that currently present themselves to technically savvy online users to commit ‘cyber crimes’ would be significantly limited if identity online was compulsory. This could be likened to the physical offline world, where governmental instruments such as passports, driving licenses and investigative powers of the authorities are utilised, at least in part, to combat illegal activities. Given the ability to bypass identification in the online world in many online environments then, cyber crime can be viewed under classical crime theories as a reaction on the part of criminals to a new opportunity. It should also be noted though that perhaps the huge growth of the internet and e-commerce can be attributed to the benefits of online anonymity, thus both creating the opportunity that cyber criminals are reacting to, as well as enabling such crimes.
The functional, Marxist view would also seem to be particularly relevant in relation to identity and cyber crime. Online users cannot only interact with the World Wide Web without identifying themselves, but can also importantly make their own choices about how to identify themselves. They can essentially mask their true offline identity with any other in the online world. This presents a huge shift in sociality in comparison to the offline world, and can have many positive effects as mentioned earlier such as a shift from physical preconceptions and the advocacy of ideas and the freedom of speech. However, whilst there are clearly still ways for the authorities to investigate and prove crimes online occurred, this ability is clearly diminished in the online environment. The deterrent effects of the law will also clearly be diminished, perhaps overconfidently by many online criminals who have little knowledge of the alternative means of tracing crime online. Not only this but the social stigma attached to crimes is diminished due to the ability to both hide ones identity, or to mask it with an alternative, online identity. The proliferation of online hate crimes is a strong example of how identity and perceptions of the difficulties facing online law enforcement can significantly influence user behavior, with the result that many crimes online are not only more likely to be committed than in the offline world, but also perceived as less socially stigmatic due to the lack of identity. It should also be stated that not only the identity of the cyber criminal is relevant here in this new online sociality, but also the lack of a physical representation of any victims, as this clearly reduces the guilt and apprehension around the social contract when committing crimes online.
The lack of victim identity, as well as the nature of many cyber crimes being committed again, big businesses brings us onto cyber crime as a new label or subculture. The online world has a huge culture of its own, and the media has also taken a prevailing view in glorifying many cyber crimes (noticeably hacking) as a victory of the little man over big businesses and governments, without any real victims. This interpretation of cyber crime differs significantly to others in that rather than explaining online crime’s proliferation as the lack of identification, this is an example of a sub-culture which views such crimes not as an opportunity as under the classical theory of crime, but instead views such acts as completely different to orthodox and typical offline crimes. Such cultures attach glory to the skill required to hack a particularly system to defraud a large company, in contrast to the stigma attached to mugging a real, physical human being on the street in the offline world. Essentially then, many cyber crimes can be explained as users seeking to create identity in the online world through their technical skill and audacity, rather than merely opportunists or criminals encouraged by the financial demands of society.
In conclusion then, the incentives and ability to commit cyber crimes are hugely influenced by the differences in identity offline and identity online. Such online crimes can clearly fit within existing criminological frameworks, but it is difficult as with any broad theory to apply a single perspective across the entirety of cyber crimes. Such crimes simply differ too much, as do users, and it perhaps the inability to identify cyber criminals and users willing to commit online crimes that is a challenge not only for the authorities, but also criminology in its future study of cyber crime. E3406