ON MONDAY morning, Senator Sarah Hanson-Young tweeted an email she’d received on the topic of Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers.In the screenshot, clearly visible, was the full name and email address of the woman who’d sent the email.The content of the email itself was horrible, and I do not condone it. Here it is, minus any identifying details:“Dumbo the smelly little illegal brats on Nauru are not held in detention they are free to
roam wherever they wish, so get your facts right wench”.Disgusting. However, Senator Hanson-Young should have at least blurred out the woman’s name and email address. I get that it’s hard to do on a smartphone, but here’s why it’s important.Senator, your own website states you won’t pull stuff like this, guaranteeing that personal information provided to the Greens won’t be disclosed unless the person consents, if it’s required by law, or for a few other reasons, none of which applied in this case.
It’s one thing to retweet someone.Tweeting a screenshot of a private email is quite something else.
Even if you disagree with the words written in a private email, you can’t post the sender’s name and email address to Twitter.Some people disagree with me on this. Their counterargument goes something like this: ‘Once you receive an email, it is your property, and you can do what you like with it, including posting it to Twitter’.Actually, no, you can’t.You’re using the same argument as those who post revenge porn to the internet. If you’re not familiar with the concept, revenge porn involves a jilted lover sharing naked photos of an ex in order to gain revenge. You cannot just share whatever happens to be in your phone or email inbox.
There’s no telling what certain individuals can get up to in the name of ‘vigilante justice’. If you’re going to direct the anger of your Twitter followers to a hot issue, don’t give them an outlet for reprisal.
These are no idle words. A whopping 47 per cent of Australian women “experienced online harassment in the past year”, according to a 2016 Norton study. Senator, this number is too high as it is. Let’s not make it easy for trolls to make it worse.
You may think that posting someone’s email address to the internet is no big deal. After all, email accounts have passwords, right?
However, more than a few of us have passwords that are a little too easy to guess.
Yours may be one of the worst 25 passwords of 2015.
Or it may be a guessable combination of your child’s name and the year they were born. For example: “Lachlan2014”.
How would hackers know those details? Well, you might have posted them to Instagram (“Welcome to the world, darling Lachlan” — May 1, 2014). Or Twitter. Or Facebook.
Hang on a sec, you say. Facebook is private.
Well, yes — sort of. However, all it takes is for one of your 100-plus friends to get their Facebook account hacked. Now that hacker can see your posts, including that beautiful moment where you welcomed little Lachlan to the world.Of course, the onus is on us to pick a secure password. But by publicising someone’s email address, you make it easier for hackers to break in. And why would an Australian senator make it easier for criminals to do their work? One in five Australians have been the victims of identity crime, according to the most recent data from the Australian Institute of Criminology. Why would an elected official want to make it worse?Compounding the issue, once hackers have control of your email account, they can often take over your Facebook, Amazon or eBay account, among others.
For example, the hacker could visit Amazon. They’d click ‘forgot your password?’ on the login screen. Next, they’d be asked for an email address. The hackers would give your email address, since they can now access your emails. Once the email with the password reset instructions arrives from Amazon, the hackers change the password to your Amazon account. They’re in. They’re shopping. And you’re locked out. Rinse and repeat for eBay, Facebook, Instagram and so on.
Fraud perpetrated on Australian-issued credit cards amounted to more than $400 million last financial year — let’s not add to this tally, please.
Senator, please blur out identifying details such as private email addresses before posting them to the internet. Then we can go back to discussing the bigger issues of the day, such as Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers
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