Their Very Own Wonderland

The hacker collective ‘Anonymous’ has reportedly planned to develop a social network with extremely well-developed privacy and security settings so that it overshadows the likes of Facebook and other famous sites.

The user data from such a website will not be collected by any central authority; therefore, there will be no central authority to modify, analyse and monitor the data. As reported:

“A new social network, backed by members of Anonymous, hopes to take on Facebook and the other social media giants with a commitment to privacy, security and transparency about how posts are promoted.”

Users here will also be rewarded for activity and participation in discussions online. It is said to be a direct hit against biggies like Facebook and Twitter, who have the power of modifying the data on their website.

The Anonymous has collected and shown proof through years of records of Twitter and Facebook manipulating users and not allowing basic freedom of speech and expression. Take, for example, the recent report in ‘Breitbart’ which showed that Twitter was “shadowbanning” users it thought were “politically inconvenient”. The social network it said to keep a tab on its users and bury the tweets of those users, which are deemed unfavorable.

These groups of favorable and unfavorable users supposedly fall into the categories of “blacklist” and “whitelist”. The ones belonging to the former are mainly said to be “populist conservatives, members of the alternative right, cultural libertarians, and other anti-PC dissidents”.

Another One Bites The Dust

Funnily, a pro-Donald Trump account run by Ricky Vaughn has also borne the brunt of ‘shadowbanning’! This policy where Twitter favours those whose tweets they find to be politically viable are at odds with the basic principles of a social network’s foundation – that is to connect people and allow the free flow of public opinion. Social media has been cited as an important tool to propagate ideas in mass movements like the Arab Spring Revolution, dubbed by the ‘Policy Mic’ as “The Twitter Revolution”.

The ‘Libertarian Republic’ has reported that there “is little room left for doubt” that Twitter is on a silent mission to silence conservatives. It has continued to report that, “Furthermore, it has demonstrated a complete lack of regard for transparency, concealing its shadowbanning system from users and hiding its political bias behind a veneer of opposition to online abuse.” The most explosive thing mentioned is the “blind eye” turned by Twitter to “abuse from left wingers”!

Facebook too doesn’t fall far behind in prying into the day to day lives of its users. ‘The Independent’ has reported about a sinister method undertaken by the website where for an entire week in 2012, “Facebook skewed nearly 700,000 users’ news feeds to either be happier or sadder than normal.” It also reported that Facebook may be violating European privacy laws to keep a watchful eye on its users.

If you can’t wait for a super-secure private messaging system, then why not add a layer of protection by getting yourself a VPN?