Sort of.
Malcolm did not supply his real name but he posted his
photo (above) on Facebook this afternoon, along with a long commentary, explaining his
reasons for not providing his true ID. A longtime worker in the computer field,
he cited numerous observations that make him fear identity thieves and the
impact of data mining.
The man in the photo is easily recognizable to those,
like the gadflies running against the council incumbents, who routinely attend
Sterling Heights City Council meetings or watch them on cable TV. (I will honor
his wish not to have his name appear online, even as he acknowledges that he is
not some mystery man in Sterling Heights political circles.)
Another interesting aspect of this story is that Malcolm
McEasy has spent months imparting scathing criticism – accompanied by videos of
council meetings – on the council challengers, led by mayoral candidate Paul
Smith, who has been slammed repeatedly as a bigot. Among his targets has been
Joe Judnick.
But the latest knock on Judnick is a Facebook message he
posted late Tuesday night that expressed outrage over radical online messages
carrying the hashtag #KillTheCops, which the candidate attributes to minorities
seeking revenge against the perceived racial insensitivity displayed in recent
months by white cops against black folks. (That’s putting it nicely.)Malcolm has mentioned several times online that he comes from a long line of relatives who have served in law enforcement. And in a bit of a Facebook about-face, over the past 36 hours he has made it plain that he doesn’t appreciate people blasting Judnick for his post advising cops facing blacks: "If any doubt … shoot!”
In fact, Malcolm seems to be expressing some sympathy for Judnick when the embattled candidate asserts that, in too many instances, white cops are now under siege, viewed as the enemy for every action they take when confronting a black man or woman or child.
Addressing those who question his online credibility, here is what he posted on the Facebook group page, Sterling Heights Local Politics:
What's in a Name?
Over the past week, there have been comments regarding
the use of pseudo-names by several of our group members, myself included.
Many (including me) have been accused of having more than
one active identity, and have been accused of using pseudo-names as a means of
hiding our identity so we may secretly stick it to one or more candidates
without anyone knowing it is us.I have made no secret of my IRL identity (I have told anyone who asks), but I would like to take a few minutes to explain the REASON why I do so.
And before I start, for the 1 or 2 people in the (Facebook) group who don't already know me, the picture (above) was taken a few minutes ago. If you don't know who I am by looking at this picture, then you aren't really involved in local politics so it won't matter to you.
I have been actively involved in the computer industry for almost 40 years. I have been active in privacy issues for a little over 30 years (ever since reading the 1982 book "The Puzzle Palace").
Whether you know it or not, there is a process called 'data mining' which is being actively used by corporations, political parties, identity thieves and others to create a highly detailed profile of both you and your daily activities.
Every time you click on a web link, every time you post on social media, every time you make a comment on a newspapers web site, that data is added to your profile.
It gets even worse: using the comments you make on social
media, it is possible to develop a fairly accurate profile of your entire life;
what you believe, what you support, what you oppose, what 'dangerous' ideas you
have.
This data mining technique is especially dangerous when
companies and individuals cross reference your online identity with publicly
accessed information on your real life identity.
Already, for example, political groups have created
databases of individual voters for entire states which use the information
collected to better convince you to vote for their candidate. And corporations
(who are not subject to the same 4th amendment limitations as the government),
will often sell your information to those annoying advertisers who call your
home at dinner time every week.
It is also possible, with very little effort and very
little computer skill, to cross reference you with your online
"friends", and their "friends" and so on until you have
compiled a real life database of real people to be used for both good and evil.
With the advances in social media, more and more people
are putting their personal information out for the whole world to see. Thieves
know this, and are taking advantage of it.
You only need to watch the news for a week to see stories
where people post "heading on vacation for a week" to their online
accounts; only to come home to find their home robbed.
Identity thieves love social media. When a user friends
their family members, the thief now can know your mother’s maiden name. When a
user joins a group from their high school, that gives thieves another answer to
familiar 'security questions' used by credit card companies.
In short: people actively assist those who are robbing
them because they willing put every aspect of their life on the internet for
the world to see.
For me, the solution is to break the link between the
online identity and the real life identity. With this one simple step, you
break the essential link necessary for identity thieves and others who would
use your online information to harm (or manipulate) you in real life.
This technique is especially useful if you use the same
online identity all the time. The name I use on Facebook, for example, is the
same name I have used in ALL of my online activity for the last 13 years.I have used this name here, on twitter, on YouTube, on Google +, on Yahoo, on newspaper comments around the world, and countless other occasions where web sites ask for a 'name'.
To the data miners, Malcolm McEasy has a vast online
presence, and (probably) a vast consumer database, but the real life person you
see in the picture below has almost none.
And by that method, I (and others) deny thieves an easy
target.
I would like to take a moment, while this incident is still clear in my head, to explain my defense of Joe Judnick in this matter.
ReplyDeleteIt is important to me that people reading this article in the years to come don’t misunderstand my motives or my position on a few of the points brought up in your article.
Mr Judnick and I were having a conversation on Facebook about two different subjects: the (sometimes) violent protests that broke out following the shooting of Michael Brown; and the open antagonism against police officers which included websites and hashtags openly calling for the murder of police officers.
As often happens in fast-moving Facebook conversations, replies would come to comments made several replies earlier, and respondents would sometimes write replies that were answers to multiple prior comments in a single reply.
In response to these two discussions, Mr Judnick made the mistake of posting a comment which, if taken out of the context of the conversation, appeared to say “if a police officer faces a black suspect, they should (when in doubt) shoot first and ask questions later.”
Needless to say a whole lot of people jumped on this comment, and it became a much talked about topic during the 2015 election.
At the time (also discussed in this article), I received a fair amount of flack myself for my attempts to defend Mr Judnick about this issue.
To be clear: I was not, and am not, defending the idea that police officers should take a ‘shoot first and ask questions later’ stance with black suspects. That is obviously an indefensible position that has no place in modern society.
Instead, my defense was based on the belief that a number of people were intentionally misrepresenting the context in which Mr Judnick’s comment was made.
To me, in the middle of that conversation, it seemed obvious that his reply was a response to two separate comment (one being the source of anti-police web sites, and the second being threats to the lives of police officers).
But instead of seeing it in the context of the conversation, many people were treating his comment as though it were a separate and independent statement.
At the time, it seemed to me that with all of the reasons someone could disagree with candidate Judnick on his position on the issues (and there were many), it just seemed unfair that he would be attacked for something that wasn’t a real issue.
So I defended him.
Again, I recognize that this article is years old. But in reading it again recently I felt it was important for me to put my side on the record so your readers don’t misunderstand why I was defending him; and where I stand on the important issues of civil rights and police powers.