STONECPS

Anonymity existed a long time already even without the presence of the Internet. If we will remember, during the Spanish period, Filipino writers who are protesting against the Spanish government like Jose Rizal and Marcelo H. Del Pilar have used pseudo names to hide their identity.

The Internet is a very powerful information channel since it offers a wider audience compared to other channels like print media. Some people, who use the Internet to disseminate information, even if their actions are ethically correct, prefer to remain anonymous. Here are some of the scenarios that I can think of where a person is acting ethically but still prefer to use anonymity:

1. Activist and leftist who are against the government may choose to remain anonymous while they express their political views and opinions against the government because disclosure of their identity might endanger their life.

If we go back in history, during the Marcos regime, Human rights groups placed the number of victims of extrajudicial killings under martial law at 1500 and over 800 abductions

(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extrajudicial_killings_and_forced_disappearances_in_the_Philippines#Marcos_regime). Even up to now that we are no longer under a dictatorship, political killings is still a big issue under Gloria-Macapagal Arroyo’s regime.

2. Another situation that I can think of is an employee who wishes to give the public information of the wrong doings of his employer. For example, an employee of an industrial company who uses chemicals to produce their products which is harmful to the environment would want to reveal this malpractice to inform the public and to stop the wrong doings of the company to save the environment. Since the revelation of the company’s malpractice will do more good than harm, then the employee’s act can still be considered as ethically correct but he might still prefer to remain anonymous for the fear of revenge from the company of he might even loose his job.

3. Another situation is when a person with a medical condition might choose to remain anonymous when that person posts his concern or question to an online discussion board because of embarrassment to admit to his medical condition.

Although I think, anonymity in the Internet is not really 100% as there are ways to trace an anonymous identity.

1. IP Address. Each computer connected on the Internet uses an IP address. ISPs have a log of all the activities in the Internet. So even though the PC uses dynamic IP addresses, the log can be check to determine the IP address and the Computer name used at a particular time at a particular day. Although a subpoena is still necessary to get these information from an ISP.

2. If the information is posted anonymously in a website, we can also trace the owner of the domain name for that website by using Internet tools like whois.

“WHOIS (who is) is the aptly named Internet function that allows one to query remote WHOIS databases for domain registration information. By performing a simple WHOIS search you can discover when and by whom a domain was registered, contact information, and more. A WHOIS search can also reveal the name or network mapped to a numerical IP address.”

(Source: http://www.wisegeek.com).

3. If the information was sent via email, the sender can be traced by the route information contained in the email header.