Human flesh search engine

[English assassin]

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/...cle4213681.ece

No, not the latest aid for German cannibals, instead its a lynching for the digital age.

when 21-year-old Gao Qianhui sat down in front her webcam last month, she had far more important issues on her mind. Upset that the three-day mourning period for the 80,000 victims of the earthquake in southwest China had disrupted her television viewing schedule, she launched into a five-minute spew of vitriol and then posted the video online.

"I turn on the TV and see injured people, corpses, rotten bodies... I don’t want to watch these things. I have no choice.” Ms Gao sighed: “Come on, how many of you died? Just a few, right? There are so many people in China anyway.”

Within hours, Ms Gao had become the latest victim of a human flesh search engine, where Chinese netizens become cyber-vigilantes and online communities turn into the world’s largest lynch mobs.

Using the vast human power behind the Chinese web, every detail of Ms Gao’s life, from her home and work address in Liaoning province, north east China, to the fact that her parents were divorced, was dug up and published on hundreds of forums and chatrooms.

“Now humiliate her,” ordered one internet user, Yang Zhiyan.

The outraged reaction to the video drew the attention of the local police and they detained Ms Gao the next day. They did not make clear what law she was alleged to have broken.

Its not about Ms Gao's views, but about the social impact of having so much information available about more or less anyone.

Obviously, you don't need a mobile phone to exclude someone socially, and you can bully someone face to face. But the internet seems to have changed two things. First is that people do leave a quite amazing amount of personal information out there, that is very very easy to assemble. (Note to UK users: always go on the "marked" electoral register, always go ex directory.) And once it's out there it's out there for ever.

The other thing is that everyone can play. This woman needed to be told by a friend or her parents that her views were callous. She didn't need 5000 losers publicly baying for blood.

And yet, you can't avoid it. In my day as a student the evening's venue was just passed around by word of mouth. Now, if you don't use social networking sites and the like, you won't hear about a lot of what goes on. Text message bullying is a problem in schools, but if a teenager doesn't have a phone, they won't be part of the scene.

Better, worse, just different? I find the reduction in privacy pretty scary, but then if you always expected the whole world to be able to find out a lot about you, maybe you don't mind? Maybe the distributed group think of human flesh search engine is the future? If it is, is that any worse than the old days of a media mogul dictating what we read from the top down? Will we all have to grow up, eg about people in public life,when every candidate is of an age when their teenage facebook entries can be accessed and we can read about their drunken exploits?

I don't like it. I realise that the technology is just making visible less pleasant aspects of people's behavior (internets don't bully people, people bully people) but still, I find it all rather orwellian. After all, if the people collectively are Big Brother, there really can be no hope of a revolution.

Any thoughts?

And yes, the irony of posting this musing online has not escaped me...

[InsaneApache]

Any thoughts?

Yes.

[Adrian II]

Already some ten years ago, a story caught my eye about a French bankrobber on the run who was caught and arrested by tracing his electronic trail: credit card use, car rental, cctv pics. These days I guess the general public can do that, too, given a few hacks and some pointers from the authorities.*

I think that mob behaviour hasn't changed and that the Web is just another venue where it manifests itself.

The truly new issue is contained in the questions about privacy. How much of ourselves can we conceal from the rest of the world if we're supposed to work and live in a 'total' network environment - and I mean literally the rest of the entire world population?

Not much. The thought is depressing.

Edit
* watch this

[Reverend Joe]

I'm gonna buy a motorcycle and abandon society as much as possible.

In all seriousness, stuff like this scares me so damn much. There is no word in the english language strong enough to express my loathing of the no-privacy state of existence that I have been born into. Really that motorcycle thing isn't much of a joke, and it's not very funny, because I'm not really joking. I really feel like I am being driven further and further away from modern society. The only thing keeping me connected is human companionship and love. I hate it so much.

[Marshal Murat]

Mob mindsets will probably become more prevalent, especially in chatrooms and forums such as these. Under pseudonyms, respectable and despicable can mix in anonymity. While not a bad thing, the best way to diffuse mob mentality is to identify people individually. Here, however, it's so much more difficult to do so, and it will only cause greater problems.

That's probably why I want to move to somewhere remote and live. With the natives who cook lamb and baklava.

[Whacker]

My immediate reaction to this was, "This does not bode well for us when the zombies attack."

[Viking]

Well, I just did a Google search on myself; and I cannot say I was able to dig up much. Not even a photo.