At 9:18 +0000 3/12/14, Kirstie.Ball wrote:
>I've had an enquiry from someone who wants to know whether there is any research on the number of people who deliberately use 'false identities' online to 'corrupt the system'.
>Putting aside some of the conceptual issues with this question, does anyone know whether there is any such research available?
G'day Kirstie
Unless the person works out what they're asking, no-one will be able to help them very much.
The best way to approach the 'false identities' notion is to start by denying that there's any such thing.
That forces the person who's using the term to explain what they mean.
A person has zero or more names that are commonly-used in some context to refer to that person.
(1) A person may indicate to someone else that 'my name is X' or 'call me Y'. That name may or may not be a commonly-used name for the person. There is a host of contexts and host of purposes why this is done, and a great many of them are entirely legitimate and even highly advisable. And, in any case, many commonly-used names started out uncommonly-used.
(2) A person may provide a name to someone else with active intent to obfuscate their commonly-used name(s). The purpose may be to avoid a disadvantage, gain an advantage, or avoid retribution. And society may regard the purpose as criminal, unreasonable, or approved by and/or beneficial to society.
(3) A person may provide a name to someone else with active intent to cause some action to be associated with some other person. The purpose may be criminal, unreasonable, or mischievous. (I suspect that some such purposes may be approved by society and/or beneficial to society; but I can't quickly come up with a good example).
The term 'false identity' is highly misleading if applied to (1) or (2).
But it's also misleading if applied to (3), because the identity isn't false - it's the claim that the person commonly uses the identity that is false.
Moreover, use of pejorative terms like 'false' and 'corrupt' confuses the issue further. Is a pseudonym adopted in a stage play 'false' and 'corrupt'? Is a pseudonym adopted in an online game 'false' and 'corrupt'?
If the person is asking about, for example, 'active misrepresentation that a person commonly uses a particular identity, as a means of committing financial fraud', a literature would be much easier to locate.
[Just as I finished this, Gary's came in. I haven't used 'inauthentic presentation'. It has the advantage of being 8 words shorter than 'active misrepresentation that a person commonly uses a particular identity', although its scope isn't *quite* the same.]
[Aside: http://www.rogerclarke.com/DV/FamousNyms.html ]
Regards ... Roger
--
Roger Clarke http://www.rogerclarke.com/
Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd 78 Sidaway St, Chapman ACT 2611 AUSTRALIA
Tel: +61 2 6288 6916 http://about.me/roger.clarke
mailto:[log in to unmask] http://www.xamax.com.au/
Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Law University of N.S.W.
Visiting Professor in Computer Science Australian National University
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