Slashdot Mirror
Does Anonymity In Virtual Worlds Breed Terrorism?
An Anonymous Coward writes "The Washington Post has an article about the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity's take on the numerous virtual worlds (e.g. Second Life) that have cropped up in recent years. IARPA's thesis is that because the Government can't currently monitor all the communication and interaction, terrorists will plot and scheme in such environments."
Anonymity breeds terrorism. end of sentence. Argueing over wether communications, or behavior should be monitered in online gaming, should be a moot point to anyone who enjoys their freedom, danger is the price you pay for freedom, freedom is the price you pay for security. But, the money aspect of it is interesting, its perfectly designed for money laundering, and at speeds previously impossible, hundreds of digital transactions could occur carrying the original sum of money with say... an hour... unlike "real" money where it would probably take months for the same transactions. Is this a "problem"? Sure, but its basically the intrinsic nature of digital currency, its the price you pay for the ability to pay the price, the only way to stop that from happening is to revert back to a tangible currency, or... try and slow the process down with registrations, redundant security checks, "Life Is No Fun Anymore [Accept] [Decline]"
This is as paranoid and bizarre as the Moral Majority freak that spit on me and ranted "my demon worshiping would condemn me to hell" outside a Virginia game store in the early 80's because I played Dungeons and Dragons.
Almost everything you said is incorrect.
"Terrorism is a phenomena that is internal to countries" - makes no sense since much of terrorism is cross-border (India hit from Pakastan, etc).
"terrorism occurs where people have been suppressed by a regime" - nonsense - Terrorism today is 99.9% by people who have one particular religious/political ideology - they are Muslims that believe that Allah will reward them for their fight against the infidels.
"...and want their freedom back" Nonsense! It has nothing whatever to do with freedom - they want everyone to be the "slave of Allah" like themselves, or dead!
"They are not well armed" - ignorant! Millions are pouring into many Muslim "charities" that support the Jihad (a basic requirement of all Muslims), and Iran is sending sophisticated weapons to Iraq...
"or have large numbers of forces at their disposal" - also nonsense. These terrorists are not the underdogs you think they are.
"Generally only small numbers of people are killed by terrorism" - well just 10,500+ since 9/11... no big deal right. You won't care if they kill you then?
"Terrorism is probably something that will emerge in America in the next few years as/if the government becomes more suppressive" - now you show yourself to be a nut. Not one American citizen has been denied their rights, and the vast majority of Americans are happy being protected.
"If I was American or British right now, I would be very concerned." - is that a threat?