National Public Radio has a story about online privacy and cybersecurity:

Cybercrime and espionage are rising rapidly, and the United States and other governments are preparing for the possibility of cyberwar. At the same time, civil libertarians worry about preserving Internet freedom.

Security experts focus on the “attribution problem” — the challenge of identifying and tracking down the source of a cyberattack. Under current conditions, cybercrime, cyber-espionage, and cyberattacks can be directed remotely, with the perpetrator’s identity and location a secret.

Privacy advocates fear the loss of anonymity for Internet users. For both sides, it’s a conflict that needs to be resolved. [...]

There is, after all, another view on the attribution problem. Maybe we don’t want all Internet transactions traceable to someone. Think of the dissidents in countries like Iran who depend on anonymity in their Internet postings. [...]

Some experts, such as Rebecca MacKinnon of Princeton University’s Center for Information Technology Policy, argue that improving the attribution of Internet transactions may not produce sufficient security benefits to justify the cost to privacy.

“Criminals and militaries are most likely going to figure out ways to do what they need to do on the Internet and minimize their traceability,” says MacKinnon. “The people who are really going to be hurt are dissidents in countries like China or Iran.”

This entry was posted on Friday, June 11th, 2010 and is filed under Anonymity, Civil liberties, First Amendment, Identification, International, Security, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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