Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse
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The Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse is a term for internet criminals, or the imagery of internet criminals.
A play on Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, it refers to types of criminals who use the internet to facilitate crime and consequently jeopardize the rights of honest internet users. There does not appear to be an exact definition for who the Horsemen are, but they are usually described as terrorists, drug dealers, pedophiles, and organised crime. Other sources use slightly different descriptions but generally refer to the same types of criminals. The term was coined by Timothy C. May in 1988, who referred to them as "child pornographers, terrorists, abortionists, abortion protestors, etc."[1] when discussing the reasons for limited civilian use of cryptography tools. Among the most famous of these is in the Cypherpunk FAQ [2], which states:
8.3.4. "How will privacy and anonymity be attacked?"
[...]
- like so many other "computer hacker" items, as a tool for
the "Four Horsemen": drug-dealers, money-launderers,
terrorists, and pedophiles.
17.5.7. "What limits on the Net are being proposed?"
[...]
+ Newspapers are complaining about the Four Horsemen of the
Infocalypse:
- terrorists, pedophiles, drug dealers, and money
launderers
The term seems to be used less often in discussions about online criminal activity, but more often in discussions about the negative, or chilling effects such activity has had on regular users' daily experiences online. It also used frequently to describe the political tactic Think of the children. A message[1] from the same mailing list states:
How to get what you want in 4 easy stages: 1. Have a target "thing" you wish to stop, yet lack any moral, or practical reasons for doing so? 2. Pick a fear common to lots of people, something that will evoke a gut reaction: terrorists, pedophiles, serial killers. 3. Scream loudly to the media that "thing" is being used by perpetrators. (Don't worry if this is true, or common to all other things, or less common with "thing" than with other long established systems - payphones, paper mail, private hotel rooms, lack of bugs in all houses etc) 4. Say that the only way to stop perpetrators is to close down "thing", or to regulate it to death, or to have laws forcing en-mass tapability of all private communications on "thing". Don't worry if communicating on "thing" is a constitutionally protected right, if you have done a good job in choosing and publicising the horsemen in 2, no one will notice, they will be too busy clamouring for you to save them from the supposed evils.
