For many years it has been an accepted fact that using the internet can be risky. For some, it might be having your data mined, in other cases you may say or do the wrong thing. There are even cases where your alleged to have done something to slander your name. But in a lot of cases it can literally ruin your life.
Far too often the internet is used as a weapon.
What is Online Slander?
Posts that are made to insinuate something, nudes (or even fakes) have been uploaded, people have been supposedly exposed. All of which ruin an individual’s life. To add insult to injury, in some cases someone then turns around and offers a crazy fee to take the post down. If you want to hold onto what’s left of your reputation you pay it.
It’s not hard to see why online slander is a lucrative business. For some sites the click bait title alone is enough to generate income. As for businesses the insinuation that competition is not on the level might be enough to give them an edge. The sad thing is there are very real people suffering as a consequence of this.
Hopefully not for much longer though.
Known Victims
Google has introduced a system called “known victims” that allows people to report to the company any of the instances above. It will then suppress any mentions of the subject in its algorithm, making it harder to be found. While Google in the past has resisted policing the web, David Graff, Google’s vice president for global policy and standards has said “We can’t police the web, but we can be responsible citizens.” It’s refreshing to hear a company speak in such a way and treating users as not a faceless mass, but as individuals.
This decision hasn’t been made in a vacuum. After certain events over the last few years (I’m sure you can think of a few) Google has faced calls to be more involved in the algorithm. Having humans looking over certain things after misinformation has spread (or in this case to prevent it) has been a call from Google’s critics.
Future of the Internet?
Going forward, it’s quite right to question how well this will be implemented. It’s going to require data and a lot of oversight to get it up and running. Also there is the real possibility that bad actors could use it to supress things they don’t want found out i.e. abuse of power. But, I don’t think anyone is reasonably expecting it to be a perfect system out of the gate and I can’t help but feel like this is a win for victims.
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