Online Anonymity and Anonymous Abuse

Catherine McKinnell Excerpts

Wednesday 24th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab) [V]]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie). I am the Petitions Committee Chair, and we have received numerous petitions on tackling online abuse, with petitioners identifying anonymity as a key contributing factor to the abuse of vulnerable people online. Last April, reality star Bobby Norris started a petition entitled, “Hold online trolls accountable for their online abuse via their IP address”, which quickly passed the 100,000 signature threshold to be considered for debate. Bobby suggested that people’s IP addresses should be used to ensure that people engaging in online abuse cannot simply open new accounts if they are blocked, but can have their social media accounts permanently deactivated.

Similarly, a petition to make verified identity a requirement for opening a social media account was created on 5 March by Katie Price, who is campaigning on the abuse faced by her son Harvey, and it already has nearly 170,000 signatures. In an evidence session last year, Katie told the Committee,

“if you go and get a mortgage, a car on HP, bank credit or whatever anyone wants, they want to know your name and address. They do credit checks…It is simple. Why can’t they do it on social media, so that if someone is being abusive then you have their address and you can find them?”

All this points to a growing public concern that anonymity allows people to get away with—and worse, encourages—horrendous abuse of a kind that would simply not be tolerated offline. Petitioners know that whatever measures we take will never be enough to stop the most determined trolls, but it is the same principle we implicitly understand when we lock our doors or install an alarm system: no home security measures will stop determined burglars, but they deter most would-be criminals.

I am co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group against antisemitism, and we have seen that anonymity also has an impact on online hate speech. In October 2020, nearly 40% of reported antisemitic abuse online during that month came from fully anonymous or partially anonymous users. It is a worrying trend, and the Antisemitism Policy Trust has written a really important briefing on this issue, which I encourage the Minister to read. Several studies have shown that anonymity can make user behaviour more aggressive by creating environments less constrained by social norms. The Law Commission’s investigation found that

“anonymity online often facilitates and encourages abusive behaviours. Combined with an online disinhibition effect, abusive behaviours, such as pile-on harassment, are much easier to engage in on a practical level.”

We have tiptoed around this issue of online harms for far too long. The Government must now set out a clear plan to address online abuse and hate speech, and give people back control of their online lives.