Anonymity
Some writers have argued that namelessness, though technically correct, does not capture what is more centrally at stake in contexts of anonymity.
Over the past few years, anonymity tools used on the dark web by criminals and malicious users have drastically altered the ability of law enforcement to use conventional surveillance techniques.
In work settings, the three most common forms of anonymous communication are traditional suggestion boxes, written feedback, and Caller ID blocking.
[6] Anonymity also permits highly trained professionals such as judges to freely express themselves regarding the strategies they employ to perform their jobs objectively.
Some consumers prefer to use cash when buying everyday goods (like groceries or tools), to prevent sellers from aggregating information or soliciting them in the future.
Many loyalty programs use cards that personally identify the consumer engaging in each transaction (possibly for later solicitation, or for redemption or security purposes), or that act as a numerical pseudonym, for use in data mining.
For example, when committing unlawful actions, many criminals attempt to avoid identification by the means of obscuring/covering their faces with scarves or masks, and wear gloves or other hand coverings in order to not leave any fingerprints.
The anonymous purchase of a gun or knife to be used in a crime helps prevent linking an abandoned weapon to the identity of the perpetrator.
In airports in most countries, passengers are not allowed to board flights unless they have identified themselves to airline or transportation security personnel, typically in the form of the presentation of an identification card.
Anonymus, in its Latin spelling, generally with a specific city designation, is traditionally used by scholars in the humanities to refer to an ancient writer whose name is not known, or to a manuscript of their work.
In legal cases, a popularly accepted name to use when it is determined that an individual needs to maintain anonymity is "John Doe".
[12][13] According to Ross Eaman, in his book The A to Z of Journalism, until the mid-19th century, most writers in Great Britain, especially the less well known, did not sign their names to their work in newspapers, magazines and reviews.
[18] The prevalence of cyberbullying is often attributed to relative Internet anonymity, due to the fact that potential offenders are able to mask their identities and prevent themselves from being caught.
A principal in a high school stated that comments made on these anonymous site are "especially vicious and hurtful since there is no way to trace their source and it can be disseminated widely.
[21] Such experiences include stalking, releasing private information by an opposing school political group, or tricking an individual into traveling to another country for a job that did not exist.
[citation needed] David Chaum is called the Godfathers of anonymity and he has a claim to be one of the great visionaries of contemporary science.
David Davenport, an assistant professor in the Computer Engineering Department of Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey, considers that by allowing anonymous Net communication, the fabric of our society is at risk.
[24] As A. Michael Froomkin says: "The regulation of anonymous and pseudonymous communications promises to be one of the most important and contentious Internet-related issues of the next decade".
A website nominally associated with the group describes it as "an internet gathering" with "a very loose and decentralized command structure that operates on ideas rather than directives".
[33] The group became known for a series of well-publicized publicity stunts and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on government, religious, and corporate websites.
Founders Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay wrote The Federalist Papers under the pseudonym "Publius" and "the Federal Farmer" spoke up in rebuttal.
The pressure on anonymous communication has grown substantially after the 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and the subsequent new political climate.
[41] An above-mentioned 1995 Supreme Court ruling in McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Commission reads:[42] "(...) protections for anonymous speech are vital to democratic discourse.
It is clearly demonstrated in a case from 2008, one in which the defendant stated on a law-school discussion board that two women should be raped, an anonymous poster's comments may extend beyond free speech protections.
Although ACTA is intentionally vague, leaving signatories to draw precise rules themselves, critics say it could mean innocent travellers having their laptops searched for unlicensed music, or being jailed for carrying a generic drug.
Infringers could be liable for the total loss of potential sales (implying that everyone who buys a counterfeit product would have bought the real thing).
[48] The history of anonymous expression in political dissent is both long and with important effect, as in the Letters of Junius or Voltaire's Candide, or scurrilous as in pasquinades.
John Perry Barlow, Joichi Ito, and other U.S. bloggers express a very strong support for anonymous editing as one of the basic requirements of open politics as conducted on the Internet.
[49] Anonymity is directly related to the concept of obscurantism or pseudonymity, where an artist or a group attempts to remain anonymous, for various reasons such as adding an element of mystique to themselves or their work, attempting to avoid what is known as the "cult of personality" or hero worship (in which the charisma, good looks, wealth or other unrelated or mildly related aspects of the people is the main reason for interest in their work, rather than the work itself) or to break into a field or area of interest normally dominated by males (as by the famous science fiction author James Tiptree, Jr who was actually a woman named Alice Bradley Sheldon, and likely JT LeRoy).
[51] Anonymity has been used in music by avant-garde ensemble The Residents, Jandek (until 2004), costumed comedy rock band The Radioactive Chicken Heads, and DJs Deadmau5 (1998–present) and Marshmello (2015–present).
