Slashdot Mirror
Should Domain-Name Registrations Require A Verifiable Real Name? (blogspot.com)
lpress writes:
The Internet was a major source of news -- fake and real -- during the election campaign. The operators of fake sites, whether motivated by politics or greed, are often anonymous. We avoid voter fraud by requiring verification of ones name, age and address. A verifiable real-names domain registration policy would discourage information fraud.
"I understand the wish to protect the privacy of a person or organization registering a domain name," argues the linked-to blog post, "but there is also a public interest." ICANN already requested comments on this back in 2015, but I'm curious what Slashdot's readers think. Should domain name registrations require a verifiable real name?
"I understand the wish to protect the privacy of a person or organization registering a domain name," argues the linked-to blog post, "but there is also a public interest." ICANN already requested comments on this back in 2015, but I'm curious what Slashdot's readers think. Should domain name registrations require a verifiable real name?
Just two days ago there was an article about a guy who put up what he thought were satirical stories, with the main actors all having HIS OWN NAME.
And people still bought it.
With as little fact-checking as we see today, do you really think a journalist is gonna do a thorough WHOIS lookup on the domain before rushing to post, let alone the average internet surfer?
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
Domain names are a nickname for an IP address, nothing more. Should you require real name to associate a nickname with an IP address, well, kinda up to each and every single domain name registry, they want a real name, then they get a real name, they don' want a real name, they don't get a real name.
When it comes to fake news, well no one is worse than the multi-national news organisations the very worst example of fake news being Fox News with CNN a close second. So, it is easy, simply make 'NEWS' are protected word, you use that word in your title or identity yourself with that in a substantive sense ie using that nomenclature to attract an audience to generate views and or revenue, than when challenged on veracity you should be required to prove it in court, big or small. Fake news in a corporate sense also means claiming to be a news station when all you produce is celebrity pulp to sell shit, throw in a tiny amount of real news to bring in viewers and censor everything you come across that your main advertisers do not wish the greater public to see. So fake news channels like Fox News and CNN how do you categorise active censorship and not on an individual basis but as a cartel.
Now the main propagandists are just all butt hurt because they have been fucked over by independent media as main stream media could no longer steal an election and nobody much gives a fuck what they write about any more. New York TImes, have not bothered with it in over 4 years, why log into something I could no longer be bothered to read. The BBC went real bad when the 'fake' conservatives took over and stacked it with corporate propagandists from the top down.
In the most absurd fashion imaginable to get more accurate news about any country the last place you go to is that countries news site. So for the US go to RT for Russia, well, you are stuck with the Beeb (BBC) there are still plenty of good journalists in there, etc. Real legislation is required to protect the word NEWS, why, because it is no different from yelling fire in a crowded fire and that is exactly what most of those fuckers have been doing for decades, even lead to war and millions of deaths just in the last couple of decades (US news, you are shite, do not use for anything, except local community news channels which can be quite good and are often far more accurate than the main stream media channels).
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
If I ran a site about tennis and one of my users Insulted one of the various touchy members of crap country royalty around the world, I could find myself detained as I cross some border. Minimally, I could see some country like that holding me until I handed the keys over to my servers so that they could sift through them to see if they could identify the person who did the insults. Or they could just charge me.
Then there are the legions of US lawyers. I could use a link to another site and they sue me for IP theft as I linked to their site. Or defamation, or whatever shitbrained law that a US lawyer thinks they can exploit to ruin my life for a few bucks.
These are two problems that took me two seconds to think of. I suspect if you think this all the way through it won't just be sort of a bad idea, but the sort of idea that only bad people come up with.
Anonymity is important on the web. Powerful political or business figures won't take kindly to Joe Average posting unflattering information about them. Anonymity facilitates the flow of information. Also it provides a modicum of protection from the unhinged or stalkers.
Now, must it be absolute? No. If someone is engaging in criminal activity, a warrant should be able to unseal the owner's name. Otherwise, I don't see a societal benefit from forcing domain name registrants to be public information.
There's going to be more howling to "curate" the news and muzzle the Internet as a result of the latest election. One side was the establishment candidate, and that candidate lost. Many very powerful people supported that candidate. They're not going to shrug and walk away from something they perceive thwarted their efforts. That's not how they became powerful.
You don't understand; this is the world of a post-Trump election. The left is now beating the drum in support of all kinds of issues they used to oppose: censorship; stripping internet anonymity; gun ownership; violent revolution; succession. Their surveillance state that they loved and supported under Obama, they're now demanding he tear down in his final months lest Trump become its master. The office of the unaccountable god-emperor President, beloved by the American left just 13 days ago, is now their greatest fear.
Simply put, the tantrum response to the election will continue, regardless of previous beliefs, regardless of well-understood reasons for why some things are the way they are, and especially regardless of any Supreme Court ruling. It's all gone upside-down and you should expect to see the left continue to attack free speech. What began years ago as "political correctness" and accelerated more recently into "micro-aggression" and "safe-spaces," has now turned on the afterburner and is proceeding a mach speed into naked censorship.
Free speech was a vital tool for the left 50 years ago when they were the minority. When they became the majority it was no longer necessary. Now that they're a retreating and threatened majority, it's a danger to them.