Malwebolence

Because of the way the Internet is built, it is able to grow and change in a manner more rapid than we could ever expect. And while it is true that it indeed has countless benefits, it also has countless unintended consequences that deeply affect the end user in a way that (I believe) no one ever foresaw.

Trolling is one such effect of the internet’s dehumanizing aspect. The net allows people both express on a world platform what they once could not express, but it also allows people to hind behind handles or profiles, lending complete anonymity to their actions online. The result: complete non-accountability. An internet troll has been defined by Wikipedia as “someone who posts controversial and irrelevant or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum or chat room, with the intention of provoking other users into an emotional response or to generally disrupt normal on-topic discussion”. At a time when people groom their online personas as meticulously as they groom themselves, trolling has become more dangerous than ever.

In an article entitled “Malwebolence” by Mattathias Schwartz, published by the New York Times, trolling’s more dangerous after-effects are made known – shedding light on this dangerous new development yet perhaps giving more of the undeserved attention that these trolls seek. Some of the acts detailed in the article have led to public embarrassment and humiliation – such as Jason Fortuny’s (a self-proclaimed troll) act of pretending to be a woman and posting a fake on Craig’s List for a “str8 brutal dom muscular male”. Fortuny posted the names, photos and contact info of the men who responded on his blog under the heading “the Craigslist Experiment.” But some acts can be more dangerous, such as the trolls’ attack against the Epilepsy Foundation website – flooding the site’s forum with flashing images. At least one photosensitive person with epilepsy claimed she had a seizure. And then some attacks are fatal. The article talks about the suicide of a 13-year old girl named Megan Meier after receiving cruel messages from a boy she had been flirting with on MySpace. It was later found on that the boy was in fact not real, but a fictional creation Lori Drew, mother of one of Megan’s former friends. What is increasingly unnerving about this emerging trend is the amorality that comes with the trolling.

“Lulz”, a corruption of LOL (laugh out loud), is what trolls use to rate and keep track of their actions. The article defines “lulz” as “the joy of disrupting another’s emotional equilibrium.” It is “watching someone lose their mind at their computer 2,000 miles away while you chat with friends and laugh,” said one ex-troll in the article. According to the writer, the rules for lulz are simple: “1. Do whatever it takes to get lulz. 2. Make sure the lulz is widely distributed. This will allow for more lulz to be made. 3. The game is never over until all the lulz have been had.”

In the days following the Megan Meier suicide, a controversial blog called Megan Had It Coming came out. As a blog supposedly written by an anonymous classmate, “the blog called Megan a “drama queen,” so unstable that Drew could not be blamed for her death. “Killing yourself over a MySpace boy? Come on!!! I mean yeah your fat so you have to take what you can get but still nobody should kill themselves over it.” After a third post, the author came forward, saying she was Lori Drew. But it wasn’t her. It was, in fact, another Jason Fortuny experiment, designed to “question the public’s hunger for remorse and to challenge the enforceability of cyberharassment laws”. While this particular act of trolling (putting up a pretend blog designed to irk affected people) is not as dangerous as the others, does this kind of justification make it okay? How and where do we draw the line then, between which motives are valid and which ones are reprehensible – criminally punishable, even?

According to Fortuny, when justifying the attack on the Epilepsy Foundation’s site, “demonstrating these kinds of exploits is usually the only way to get them fixed.” But what of trolls who merely “do it for the lulz”?

And then there are some who do it for other reasons entirely. They seem to have assumed the role of gatekeepers whose primary task it was to rid the Internet of participants whom they didn’t deem worthy. Weev is one such troll. “I want everyone off the Internet. Bloggers are filth. They need to be destroyed. Blogging gives the illusion of participation to a bunch of retards. . . . We need to put these people in the oven”, he said in the article.

"Weev" has attained superstar status in the trolling community. “He is said to have jammed the cellphones of daughters of C.E.O.’s and demanded ransom from their fathers; he is also said to have trashed his enemies’ credit ratings,” the article outlines - some of his many infamous troll pranks. He lives what he calls the “ruin” lifestyle — “moving from condo to condo, living out of three bags, no name, no possessions, all assets held offshore.” Being a member of a group of hackers called “the organization,” which, according to him, brings in upward of $10 million annually, he says he can wreak ruin from anywhere.

I remembered shuddering with frustration as I read some of Weev’s more dangerous ideas in the article. In talking about his philosophy of global ruin, he has this to say: “We are headed for a Malthusian crisis,” he said, “the question we have to answer is: How do we kill four of the world’s six billion people in the most just way possible?” I fear the day that a plausible answer will come to him.

In the article, the author Schwartz asks whether or not free speech includes both the power to move away from the truth as well as towards it. I am unsure as to whether it’s better to redefine what can be covered under free speech and expression or to police the troll’s action by gauging how damaging the effects of the prank are. It is a presumption that an person intends the consequences of his actions, after all.

In the US, several states have proposed putting forth legislation responding to the growing trend of cyberbullying – making it a crime to send or post communication with the intent to cause substantial emotional distress. But what will fall under the scope of that law, were it to be passed there, or in our country? Also, an unintended consequence of a comprehensive regulatory law which punishes content tending to cause emotional distress would be to curtail freedom of speech in what may very well be the last frontier of pure and unadulterated free expression.
If making such behavior legally contemptuous leads to consequences too ominous than the behavior it seeks to prevent, perhaps the answer lies merely in empowering the end user. After all, trolls thrive on the emotional torment that comes from being affected by what they post online. The simplest and most immediate way to fix the problem, then, is to pay trolls no mind.

The actions, though some are not yet legally punishable, are morally reprehensible. I am of the opinion that some accountability must be had, even though there may be consequences. I say this because it cannot be denied that the anonymity the internet provides has awakened some of the basest, most deplorable instincts that some would never have acted on if it weren’t for the certainty that they wouldn’t get caught. If we don’t at least attempt to police it now, who knows to what extent it will grow in the future?

The whole text of the article may be viewed here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/magazine/03trolls-t.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5124&en=b5085d50ee5c65e5&ex=1375329600&partner=facebook&exprod=facebook