[Sharing] Even the anonymous online world is a public space, I read "Out of Control Anonymous Justice"

This time, I am very happy to receive a letter from Baoding Publishing. I learned that the in-depth report "SNS Violence: なぜ人はAnonymous の Blade をふるうのか" published by the Mainichi Shimbun the previous year (2020) will be released in Chinese translation!

(There is no thunderstorm below, you are welcome to purchase the book through the link below)

Book Links:
📚 Physical Books: Shopee ｜ Blog Come ｜Elite｜ Jinshitang
📚 E-Books: Blogs ｜ Readmoo ｜ Google Books ｜ myBook ｜ KOBO

Freedom of speech is not being able to say what you want to say

The title of the Chinese translation is a bit different from the original Japanese version. The title of the Chinese translation is "Out of Control Anonymous Justice: Smearing and Slandering, Witch Hunting, Every Word You Type Is a Weapon to Hurt People" has a cautionary meaning, reminding everyone. For those who read the title of this book, freedom of speech does not mean that you can say what you want to say. Cyberspace is also a public place. If you can’t say it in real life, don’t say it on the Internet.

That's exactly what I wanted to say after reading this book. It happens that the recent work includes assisting in the management of online anonymous discussion communities. From the perspective of community administrators, to ensure the discussion quality of online anonymous discussion communities, in addition to the content of board rules, when the atmosphere of community discussion begins to emerge When there is a smell of gunpowder, or when someone makes an emotional statement against a specific ethnic group or a specific netizen, it is very important for the community administrator to show up in a timely manner.

Semi-closed online communities can assign community administrators to help control the discussion atmosphere, but most social media do not have such a role. Everyone has registered accounts on social software such as Facebook, Instagram, LINE, etc. It is impossible to expect the development of these social media companies to hold such positions. Community software such as Facebook and Instagram also have public accounts and private accounts. If it is a communication software such as LINE, it is even more impossible for a software company to do such a job. In a truly private community or encrypted communication software, it is impossible for the software development company to see or obtain the content of the user's communication.

So what should be done? A very important concept: the online world is also a public place, whether it is an anonymous website or a private community, the online world is a public place, and what everyone knows should not be done in real life should not be done in the online world. . If you can't say it in the real world, don't say it (type it out) in the online world. These digital footprints cannot be deleted. Everyone must have this understanding in their hearts. I believe that as long as the concept of "Internet world = public places" can be made known to more people, the atmosphere of public opinion on the Internet will definitely become better.

Why dare to speak freely in the anonymous online world?

This is the most profound feeling when reading this book. But when it comes to the content of this book, in fact, the subtitle of its Japanese title "Why do people brandish the famous anonymous sword" is the problem consciousness that runs through the book - why when we enter the online world where we can be anonymous, Intensified in words and deeds? What can't be said in real life, why does it seem to be easy to say when it comes to the anonymous space on the social network? What were these netizens who danced with the trend on the Internet and slandered and hurt others, what were they thinking when they posted?

"SNS (social networking service)" in Japanese is actually "social networking, social networking site" in Chinese. The original Japanese text is marked "SNS violence", which is about (verbal) violence on social networking sites.

There are hundreds of social network services, and the social platforms commonly used by Internet users in different countries are slightly different. Unlike Taiwanese Internet users who use Facebook at a relatively high rate (according to the 2022 edition of the "Taiwan Internet Report" , 90.8% of Internet users in Taiwan are using Facebook, and only 30.9% are using Twitter), Japanese Internet users The proportion of people who use Twitter is much higher (in the 2022 edition of the Japan Internet Report by the same agency, only 30.8% of Internet users in Japan use Facebook, and 58.2% use Twitter). Unlike when you create an account on Facebook, you must enter "last name" and "first name" (although you can enter a first name that is not your real name, but it still has to conform to the format of "last name + first name"), Twitter account does not have this restriction. Names and IDs can also be changed several times, making it easier for the Twitter ecosystem to develop a culture of anonymity.

Being anonymous on social networking sites is like gaining an invisibility cloak, feeling that no one knows you and won't be discovered who you are. The quality of a tool does not depend on the item itself, but on how the person who uses it will use it. If it falls into the wrong hands, unfortunate results may occur, and the consequences may not be borne by the perpetrators.

Anyone who sees this post now must be a social network user. In this book, in addition to slander and slander on the Internet (people who have been hit by Yanshang), there are also people who have "followed the trend" on the Internet and participated in cyberbullying. The Mainichi Shimbun, a major national newspaper, also explores the role of the media in these "Internet incidents" (the part that scours the Internet for hot topics to help fan the flames and earn click-through rates). The content of more books will not explode, let's go and flip through the books~

Book Links:
📚 Physical Books: Shopee ｜ Blog Come ｜Elite｜ Jinshitang
📚 E-Books: Blogs ｜ Readmoo ｜ Google Books ｜ myBook ｜ KOBO

What's not written in the book

At the end of this article, there is still a little bit of information output.

The book "Daily News" was published in the second half of 2020, and I saw the promotion but didn't buy the book. If you are a little sensitive to Japanese news and current affairs, or fans who have been following this site for a long time, you may think that this book is in the reality show "Double Apartment" participants Kimura Hanako, Ito Shiori to Hasumi Toshiko (はすみとしこ) , Sugita Shuimai, Osawa Shengping and others filed a lawsuit soon after the publication. It is written in the final conclusion of the book that it only took about a month for this book to be completed (who is going to scare you to death!?). That is to say, there are quite a few of these classic cases in the book about 2020.

However, the Chinese translation is 2 years slower than the original Japanese version. After Kimura Hana passed away, how to solve or prevent online slander has become a mainstream consensus, which also forced the Japanese government to put forward countermeasures as soon as possible. Therefore, the relevant laws and countermeasures in this book are actually outdated information. Unfortunately, when I received the manuscript beforehand, I found that the book was not updated with the latest information: Shiori Ito's civil lawsuit against Noriyuki Yamaguchi was closed on the 7th of last month , but the book still wrote "All The case is still on appeal", without adding the Chinese version editor's note, but the book was already sent for printing at that time, just one step away QQ

Further reading: The opened black box: The civil lawsuit against Shiori Ito against Noriyuki Yamaguchi ends after 5 years

I also have a problem with the translation of the term "Korean in Japan" in the book. There is no way to accept the wording of "Korean Japanese" and "Korean Japanese" (Koreans in Japan do not have Japanese nationality), and There are still two translations of the same word in the same paragraph, but it is too late to change it.

Japan's current relevant amendments and discussion directions

In a word, the current part of Japan's current laws and practices related to Internet slander:

(1) Amend the law to simplify the litigation process for querying anonymous commenters

Last year (2021), Japan revised the "Internet Service Provider Liability Limitation Law ( プロバイダLiability Limitation Law)", which has not been changed since it hit the road in 2002. In the case of Japan, if an Internet user wants to sue others for slandering him anonymously on the Internet, and who is the person who wants to be anonymous (there is a way to sue the other party for defamation), it must be divided twice:

1. First go to the court to ask the social network platform operator to provide the IP location of the anonymous sender when he posted the article.
2. After obtaining the IP location, go to court again and ask the ISP to provide the address of this IP location.

After the amendment to the law was passed last year, starting from October 1 this year, if there is a similar demand in the future, it only needs to be done once: the parties make this request through the court, social network platform operators and Internet service providers at the same time. After the platform operator learns the IP location, the social network platform operator informs the Internet service provider, and the Internet service provider will directly communicate with the party when it finds the IP location. That is to say, from the perspective of the parties, the whole process only needs to be run once, and there is no need to run the court twice.

(2) Aggravating the crime of insult in the Criminal Law

If you receive a black letter from private messages on the Internet, because you are not speaking in public on the Internet, you cannot use the crime of damage to reputation under the Criminal Law. Only the crime of insulting under the Criminal Law is applicable. However, the crime of insult was originally the lightest punishment among the statutory sentences, and the maximum punishment could only be "subject materials" whose detention days did not exceed 30 days or less than 10,000 yen.

After Kimura Hana's death, Kimura Hana's mother, Kimura Kyoko, believed that the crime of insult was too light to deal with slander and slander causing death, so she initiated an online petition calling for a higher penalty for the crime of insult.

The recent amendment to the "Criminal Law" has been passed. Starting from July 7 this year, the punishment for insulting crimes will be increased to a maximum of one year of "penalty and imprisonment" or a "fine" of less than 300,000 yen, and the statute of limitations will be extended from one year to three years. , to prolong the possible time of the search, perhaps more evidence of online defamation can be obtained, otherwise it would take too much time to ask the social networking site operating company to provide the anonymous poster’s personal information. Based on the aforementioned stories, most of the amendments to the crime of insult have been dubbed the "Kimura Flower Clause" by the media.

(3) The Ministry of Justice can require Internet operators to delete hate speech

Hate speech is under the control of the Ministry of Justice. If the Ministry of Justice believes that the content on the Internet involves hate speech, it can request Internet operators to delete the article in accordance with the "Hate Speech Elimination Act ( ヘイトスピーチ Elimination Act , available in English, Chinese and Korean )." However, in practice, Internet operators may not necessarily cooperate with the deletion of articles in response to the relevant requirements of the Ministry of Finance. "Yomiuri Shimbun" reported that 30.3% of the posts were not deleted by the industry, and most of them were " tribal discrimination (tribal differences)." It is believed that foreign Internet operators do not understand the historical context of Japan's "tribal discrimination" and cannot understand where the problem lies, so they are unwilling to cooperate with the deletion of the article.

Extended reading: "Horizonha Manifesto" after a century of history: Japan's "discriminated tribes" and the anti-discrimination movement

(4) The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications considers intervening in platform processing

Although hate speech can be dealt with by the Ministry of Justice, not all defamation on the Internet is related to hate speech. At this time, it is necessary to change the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications: Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications manages Internet operators.

Since 2018, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications has established an expert meeting of the "Platform Service Research Association ( プラットフォームサービスに開する Research Association )" to regularly discuss the supervision of online platform operators, including online defamation, fake news and other issues. The "Illegal and Harmful Information Consultation Center (Illegal and Harmful Information Consultation Center)" under the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications will also assist in dealing with public complaints about slanderous content.

With the change of the times, in the past, it was believed that the responsibility for publishing hate speech, spreading false information, and slandering others on the Internet was only for PO writers, but now more and more attention is paid to the platform operators must actively participate in the management of the content on the platform. But how to require platform operators to intervene in management? To what extent should platform operators do? Will this violate freedom of speech? Another series of difficult questions.

The question facing Japan now is: Is this part to be regulated by platform operators? Or will there be national (Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications) legislation to regulate platform players? At present , the direction that the Japanese Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications is considering is to "please" large-scale Internet platform operators to actively provide the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, the platform's method of handling online defamation disputes, and to delete relevant information on malicious posts on the platform (how to implement it, and how many posts to delete). etc.), after the relevant information is handed over to the government, the government’s task force will determine whether the platform operator’s handling is appropriate.

However, this idea has also caused dissatisfaction among platform operators. After all, there is currently no substantive law requiring platform operators to do so. The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications can only "request platform operators to cooperate", but what should platform operators do in practice? To what extent? Still no clear benchmark. There are great differences in the nature of the platforms of various Internet platform operators, and multinational companies and local Japanese Internet companies will face different challenges. Even platform operators have very different positions.

At present, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, the expert meeting and the platform industry are still discussing, and it seems that it is difficult for all parties to reach a consensus in a short period of time.

Book Links:
📚 Physical Books: Shopee ｜ Blog Come ｜Elite｜ Jinshitang
📚 E-Books: Blogs ｜ Readmoo ｜ Google Books ｜ myBook ｜ KOBO

This article is simultaneously published in the Japanese current affairs まとめ translation of Kaori Ishikawa .