The local or national laws of the host nation or state could provide mechanisms for subpoenaing the identities of customers who abuse the privileges of pseudonymity and contravene local law. A nation-state would have to cooperate in applying its own laws, but some nations might refuse to do so, offering instead a national data haven to attract the business of customers desiring to keep all of their activities on the global grid unidentified. Even if anonymous remailers are tolerated because they provide a useful service or are suffered because there is no meaningful mechanism for enforcing a prohibition against them, technological means for blocking messages from such servers still exist.
Predictor: Branscomb, Anne Wells
Prediction, in context:In her 1995 paper “Anonymity, Autonomy and Accountability,” published in the Yale Law Journal, Anne Wells Branscomb writes: ”Presumably, commercial information vendors and service providers would be free to set their own rules governing the anonymous posting of messages, defining the appropriate uses of aliases and pseudonyms, and demarcating the electronic channels in which such uses would be acceptable. Furthermore, commercial services, including commercial anonymous remailers, must know who their customers are in order to bill them or their legal representatives or agents. Thus, the local or national laws of the host nation or state could provide mechanisms for subpoenaing the identities of customers who abuse the privileges of pseudonymity and contravene local law. A nation-state would have to cooperate in applying its own laws, but some nations might refuse to do so, offering instead a national data haven to attract the business of customers desiring to keep all of their activities on the global grid unidentified. Even if anonymous remailers are tolerated because they provide a useful service or are suffered because there is no meaningful mechanism for enforcing a prohibition against them, technological means for blocking messages from such servers still exist.”
Biography:Anne Wells Branscomb, an expert in technology and the law, was the author of “Who Owns Information? From Privacy to Public Access” (Basic Books, 1994), and the 1995 Yale Law Journal article “Anonymity, Autonomy, and Accountability as Challenges to the First Amendment in Cyberspaces.” (Legislator/Politician/Lawyer.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Controversial Issues
Subtopic: Anonymity/Personal Identity
Name of publication: The Yale Law Journal
Title, headline, chapter name: Anonymity, Autonomy, and Accountability: Challenges to the First Amendment in Cyberspaces
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://web5.infotrac.galegroup.com/itw/infomark/25/937/33272584w5/purl=rc2_EAIM_1_Anonymity,+autonomy,+and+accountability_________________________________________________________&dyn=sig!1?sw_aep=ncliveec
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Bricker, Erin E