(Gage Skidmore via Wikipedia Commons)
Jennifer Lawrence Article CNN
As background to this story, on August 31st, 2014, on the notorious internet imageboard known as "4chan," nude pictures of celebrities were publicly posted for the world to see and subsequently share. News regarding this incident, popularly referred to on the internet world as "The Fappening," spread like wildfire, with news sources and individuals alike eager to their hands on they mystery that was surrounding this issue. How were the pictures even accessed in the first place? Why now? As more details came to light in the coming weeks since the initial release of the pictures, it became clear that the pictures came from hacking into targeted celebrities' iClouds.
Now, more than a month after the issue first came up, the dust is finally starting to settle around this whole leak, with the release of pictures slowing down as well as tighter internet control with helping stop the spread of them. Just today, a cover story interview by Vanity Fair with Jennifer Lawrence, one of the targeted celebrities, was released. In this interview, Lawrence firmly stated that "it is not a scandal. It is a sex crime," condemning both the hackers who released the images and the people who looked at the images of both her and other celebrities.
This is interesting on a few different levels. First, it is interesting to see how Lawrence is drawing the line between a "scandal" and a "sex crime." In all honestly, I personally agree with her, as the complete infiltration of privacy that comes from the inherent nature of hacking as well as the sharing of these images by the internet community transcends that of what a mere scandal is. A scandal is something that is more alleged or sort of sketchy. In this situation, Lawrence's private pictures are being completely exploited for money (as they were initially bought) and personal pleasure. Though there may not be a category of sex crime that can currently fit this exact situation, the premise of exploitation still lays inherent. Another thing to keep in mind is being able to trust modern security and storage on the internet. Cloud-type storage systems are quite common now, with such being usually default on lots of current technology such as the smartphone. However, is it really alright for us to put so much faith into something that we don't really know much about? In trying to integrate "bigger and better" technology more and more quickly into our daily lives, we may be sort of failing to see its shortcomings and vulnerabilities.
Anyway, here's a couple questions for you guys to think about:
-What do you think about Jennifer Lawrence's statement regarding the issue. Is is a scandal, sex crime, or something else?
- What do you think of media and public response in regards to the issue? I didn't totally go into it here, but I know that celebrity bloggers like Perez Hilton had shared images (but censored) to his site. Websites like Reddit had entire sections dedicated to sharing the images (though this page eventually banned).
-How does public perception play into this issue? Just because the nudes are of specific celebrities, why does that have to make them any more special than those of non-celebrities? Do we place too much faith into the image of the modern celebrity?
-Do we rely too much on the espoused (and assumed) merits of technology? Do we need to pay more attention to its shortcomings? Is modern technology just an entire market of spin?
9 comments:
In my opinion, the distinction between "scandal" and "sex crime" depends largely on which angle you choose to view this event. If we choose to focus on the fact that celebrity nude photos were leaked, which is unfortunately all too common today, then I would agree that this could be classified as a "sex crime." However I'm inclined to call this a scandal since I believe the more interesting facet of this story is the means by which the nudes were leaked; by "hacking" into the cloud. In this case I find it is more of a scandal as to the poor, or at least questionable security, in this case on Apple's part, but on the idea of the cloud in general. So to address the question regarding our reliance on technology, I must say that we are far too dependent and trusting of modern technology. As the market for computers and the like is so massive and accessible, I would hazard a guess to say that most are unaware that such breaches in security are very real. A few years ago Sony also faced difficulties with persona information that had been stored on the cloud, and yet with both this and the more recent attack, cloud storage is still widely used. While I don't see this as deliberate spin, certainly consumers must be made aware of these shortcomings in order to better protect themselves from potential attacks, and to prompt greater security for our personal photos and the like.
I think this is a criminal invasion of privacy more than anything else. The public response was pretty predictable, but I found the media response to be hilarious. CNN referring to an anonymous imageboard as a single person, a single sysadmin nonetheless, was absolute comedy gold.
Regarding technology, Apple probably figured that they could cut some corners with their services, as the kind of consumer that they market towards would think you were some kind of super-hacker if you just did some stuff in command line. Rather than being too dependent on and trusting of modern technology, I think that people just don't understand it and blame technology for their own user error.
I don't think we give modern technology enough credit, and I think this will become much more clear once the automation revolution happens in the near future. Some may be a bit sour about the entire transportation industry no longer needing human labor and disappearing practically overnight, however the benefits that automation provides will make our old economy and society seem completely archaic, and overall quality of life will continue to improve as it always does when technological advancement happens.
I don't think it's correct that the photos were bought. The anonymous user who posted them on 4chan claimed that he had turned down a deal with TMZ. However, this does not make the crime any less deplorable. It is definitely a sex crime; her privacy was violated and she was exposed.
Nevertheless, I do not think the problem is our increasing reliance on technology. Many iCloud accounts were hacked, and according to the article, this was because the users had weak passwords and iCloud had weak password protection software. If a site allows a hacker to run thousands of passwords against certain usernames, that's a failure of the site and a failure of the user who created a dictionary password.
@Jake, I think that this is 100% a sex crime, as property was stolen. A scandal would imply illegal sexual activities; however none of this took place. Taking private pictures is legal (as long as you’re an adult), and sharing them with whoever you trust is legal. Property was stolen, and then publicized. This crime is only worsened by the private sexual content and its harsh insensitivity towards the female gender.
@Murray, while you have some valid points, I don’t think that Icloud and its "hackable" password protection should take any blame. That, in my opinion, would be like trying to blame a bank for a bank robbery. The problem relies solely in the individuals who took part in obtaining the pictures. While strengthening I-clouds defenses would be a logical thing to do to help lessen future incidents, the real problem lies in the objectification of women.
Andros brings up a good point, with objectification of women as a whole. To state the obvious, none of the hacked were males. And to point out the even more obvious, these photos were catered to other men, as the majority of reddit's and 4chan's audiences are males. Hacking into somebody else's private files is a crime, for sure. And it should be addressed like one.
Let this incident be a lesson to all of us. We must be more careful when it comes to technology. We must be aware of the risks that come with using any certain device. Responsibility for awareness should be common sense, really. And on a lighter note, I will quote Arthur Weasley by saying "not to trust something, if you can't see where it keeps its brains."
@ Andros, how does objectification of women play into this, and why is that the "real" problem here?
@Elena 4chans userbase is actually pretty evenly split gender-wise, but I am unable to comment about reddits. I don't think that this is a case of "objectification of women" just because the guys who were looking through these cloud albums weren't interested in male nudes.
Namedropping "objectification of women" alone isn't an argument. If either of you could elaborate, that would be cool.
I think Nick brings up an interesting point when referring to both Elena and Andros' posts mentioning objectification of women. I personally believe that this issue is less one of objectification, but one rather of fetishization. People who take the nudes for their own purposes are not doing it to turn the people in them into sex objects, but rather it's a sort of twisted form of worship. Because the celebrities targeted in the hacking were quite well-known and popular, the act of sharing them is more sort of an expression of obsession. I find objectification to be something that directly wrongs women, as it strips them of their humanity. Fetishization is less of a moral wrong than it is an unhealthy, obsessive sexual desire. The mere fact that the nudes were spread so quickly on the internet is a testament to this concept of fetishization. A pre-established, innate sexual desire for these women is what drove people to share and download these images. The celebrities targeted were not objectified. Rather, they fulfilled the desires of a certain population of people.
When I say this, I am by no means condoning the initial leaking and subsequent spreading and downloading of the images. I believe such a thing to be a morally incorrect and detestable invasion of privacy. However, I feel that objectification is not the proper term to be used in this context.
The female body belongs to herself and the people she chooses to share it with, but she has rightful owner ship over her body and everything it contains. Not only the physical components but the mental/emotional/spiritual components. These are all ONE, they exist as a whole and function as one. The objectification of a female is when people of ANY gender (including other females), race, or age decide to separate any of these components and neglect the others. It is when another human being does not acknowledge that a woman is a whole and that her worth is not concentrated in her thighs, her ass, her face, her lips, nor her reproductive organs. She can have nice legs, nice hair, but she is not just nice legs and just nice hair.
In this society, her naked body is meant to be hidden and only referred to in code language. For example The breasts are a provocative and forbidden OBJECT to the media, even when they are providing a new born with vital nutrients. Her naked mind and her bare thoughts are also ignored and made transparent.
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