THE UNCERTAIN FUTURE OF COMMUNICATION

Can you imagine a world without the internet?

In August next year it will be 30 years since Tim Berners-Lee published the code for the World Wide Web (www),and a few months later the first website in the United States went public.

Fast-forward to 2020. In just three decades the internet has revolutionised the way we live, work, socialise, relax and play. It has become an indispensable part of our daily lives.

It is no longer necessary to use snail mail to send a letter. Email made it possible to send a message to anyone, anywhere at the press of the send button. Back in the days, snail mail was actually efficient and locally the standard turnaround time for a reply was 24 hours. But can the same be said about email?

Want to check the prices of accommodation? Book accommodation or buy airline tickets? Attend an event without standing in a long queue? There’s online banking, online pricing, online shopping, online dealing and online gaming – just about everything is available online.

Remember the way you communicated with friends before Facebook made its grand entrance in February 2004? The social networking platform enabled us to reconnect with long-lost friends, post photos when we are on holiday and stay informed about what’s happening to friends in distant places. Its popularity is enormous – it has grown from 1.4 billion users in 2015 to 2.5 billion users in 2020.

Google Earth gave us the first 3-D interactive map of the earth when it was first launched – way back in 2001. When Google released Street View six years later, it created serious concerns about personal safety and security.

We have become so reliant on the internet that we have taken the way in which it has permeated almost every aspect of our lives for granted. That’s until you have a trolley loaded with groceries and at the till you are told, “We are sorry, the system has just gone down”. On the upside, when cheques went out of fashion, it was no longer possible to say, “The cheque is in the post,” when you queried a long-outstanding payment.

Like all advances in technology, the internet was created with the best of intentions, but there is, unfortunately, also a downside. Cybercrime has boomed and hackers are using sophisticated technologies to breach even the most secure firewalls to steal personal information which can be used for identity theft and other nefarious purposes. In recent years, there has been growing concern about the use of the internet to influence the outcomes of elections in the United States and other countries.

Despite its utility, Facebook has become a platform for incendiary messages, hate speech, disinformation and fake news by radical religious, far-right, far-left groups. The internet has also spawned sophisticated cyber crimes – online grooming, online stalking, cyber bullying, cyber stalking, phishing, credit card fraud, ransom demands.

Unlike the mainstream media where news articles are fact-checked several times, there was initially no control over “who says what” on Facebook. In Facebook’s defence, it has increasingly used algorithms to detect and block inappropriate content (messages, comments and images) and employs an army of over 7,500 people to moderate content. Despite these safeguards it is almost virtually impossible to police the posts made by Facebook’s 1.7 billion daily active users.

Synthetic manipulation of videos has made it possible to spread false messages to gullible audiences and the internet has proved to be a fertile ground for the dissemination of fake news. If there’s anything to learn from the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s just how gullible people are to share information that is obviously fake or intended to promote a specific agenda. And that in the Information Age!

We have become so reliant on the internet that we have taken the way in which it has permeated almost every aspect of our lives for granted.

So where does Namibia fit in? As a country with a small population and far removed from the world stage, Namibia seems to be an unlikely target for cyberattacks, but is that really the case? Kaspersky disclosed earlier this year that Namibia globally ranks third in terms of malware attacks on its banking sector. The cybersecurity company revealed that just short of 3% of global malware attacks aretargeted towards Namibian banks which use Kaspersky.

While the country’s Electronic Transaction Act was gazetted in November last year, Namibia still lacks comprehensive cybercrime legislation that provides protection against cyber bullying, sexual predators and a host of other cybercrimes.

Fact is: the internet has changed our way of life forever. It is here to stay and criminals will continue to find new ways of outsmarting even the most secure systems. So, just like it is important to stay safe during this time of COVID-19, practice cyber hygiene to ensure that your bank balance doesn’t disappear overnight or that your personal information is not compromised. Happy surfing!

Namibian freelance journalist and travel writer: Willie Olivier