What is the real value of online anonymity?

This post was originally published on this site

In the world portrayed in the Netflix film ANON (watch it tomorrow, May 4th, only on Netflix), privacy doesn’t exist. The government records everything you see and reviews first-person footage when de facto self-censorship fails to prevent a crime. While investigating a series of murders, a detective (Clive Owen) meets an elusive hacker (Amanda Seyfried) who has managed to remove herself from the grid. She turns the tables on him in the cat-and-mouse game that ensues, and he begins to question his devotion to the law. 

We don’t yet live in a world where police can review what you actually saw instead of taking a statement, but the topic of anonymity, particularly online, inspires strong opinions that primarily fall into two camps. There are those who simply shrug and accept the fact that a data trail is an inevitability of modern life, and there are others who defend their right to remain anonymous online as an inalienable liberty, akin to freedom of speech. Some take extreme measures to protect their information, investing time and money into platforms that let them browse, buy, and behave however they want, relatively undetected. Read more…

More about Movies, Supported, Netflix, Privacy, and Streaming