Herds Are No Longer Safe

From The Socknet

Herding is a major boon to the beasts of the Serengeti. Predators follow the herds but they can only get a few individuals, so the majority find safety in numbers. The drawback is that they attract predators because their numbers are so large.

The same may have been true for man's ancestors, but that system fails now.

Mass grouping on the Internet attracts many predators*, but it does not have the same advantage. With the advent of databases, Internet predators can attack all users of a single service at the same time with a simple SQL call.

Social networks are especially prone to this problem. Social networks collect users. If Bob wants to interact with Alice on a social network, he must subscribe to that social network. He puts his data on the same server as Alice and now they are both vulnerable to attacks.

Photos and items of privacy are one thing. Credit cards and bank accounts are another. It is inevitable that some link will form between social networks and financial institutions. When that happens, the predators will come in great droves.

A single system is like a single fence protecting all the livestock of the world.

There are some great uses for social networks. Some of these uses have been imagined, some have not and some cannot stand up to the threat of these predators. This threat is hobbling the growth of the Internet.

The Internet's first social network was email and until now, it has been the only one dedicated to interoperability. The email system sees very few attacks against its infrastructure and only a few more in the form of attempts at stealing account information. When such attacks are successful, their effects are not far-reaching.

On the Internet, a predator can target an entire herd. The herd can't provide the safety of numbers any more. It's just a bigger target.

We need smaller targets.

*

Predators include: identity theives, ad agencies, oppressive governments, etc.