Inside Dark Networks

Privacy on the internet is eroding…and eroding quickly.
A few months ago we had the Google search warrant debacle. Now we have the AOL release of very sensitive information on its subscribers.
 
Some of it is quite illuminating.

We have AOL User 2281868: Looking For Gay Black Superman With An Overbite

http://consumerist.com/consumer/aol/aol-user-2281868-looking-for-gay-black-superman-with-an-overbite-193001.php

More scary stuff at http://aohellsearches.ytmnd.com/

User 927 searches range from how long it takes broken legs to heal, to images that could send you to prison for a long time. One of this user’s searches look for questionable pictures of ‘virtual children’. In some countries, such as the UK these are classified as being the same as ‘real children’, and this carries severe penalties
http://www.consumerist.com/consumer/privacy/aol-user-927-illuminated-192502.php

You can search throught all their gory details right here: http://www.aolstalker.com/

While the AOL gaffe looks really embarrassing for them, it has a more darker side.

It is well known that in the USA we have no expectation of privacy at work: http://news.com.com/Court+rules+against+man+in+porn-at-work+case/2100-1030_3-6103544.html?tag=nefd.top
Many of the headline-grabbing cases involve the most egregious of subjects. None-the-less the rulings impact all people at work. So when you find out the local IT guy has been reading your files, he can hide behind company policy and bizarre precedent cases such as this one.

With the release of this information, the Justice Department may again pluck up the courage to demand more information on users. This would again be used to drive through an online anti-pornography law. And how can such a thing be enforced? Only by monitoring all search engines.

George Orwell’s Thought Police in the book 1984 were terrifying. We are in an age where we pass our thoughts into search engines, evaluate our results, then search again and again. A profile of how we think and what we think about can be extracted from these search engines. Do we really want to surrender that information and be judged upon it? Are these really our private thoughts or are they in the public record?