Search Engines: Friend or Foe?

Google, a huge corporation in the technology industry, exercises enormous power and influence. Its market capitalizations are comparable to the GDP of certain small countries.

With annual earnings of hundreds of billions of dollars, Google is perhaps the most powerful business in the world. Last year alone, its earnings increased by $25.8 billion. 

Google influences what billions of people see, read, and believe, effectively regulating the flow of information and affecting popular conceptions of truth and lies, reality and fiction.

As the major entryway to the internet, the world’s search engine serves as a filter through which we see the world, giving it extraordinary control over global information and communication.

This takes us to Jigsaw, a key piece of the Google jigsaw.

Jigsaw, a company formed to combat online extremism, misinformation, and cyber threats, poses serious risks to individuals who cherish privacy and free speech.

Jigsaw’s tools and technologies may be used to stifle dissent, monitor individuals, and control the flow of information, threatening the fundamental underpinnings of democratic society.

This issue was heightened by Google’s alarming choice to delete the “Don’t be evil” phrase from its code of conduct six years ago, indicating a clear shift in corporate values that prioritizes profit and power over ethical concerns.

Jigsaw has evolved to include more powerful tools, the most recent being Altitude.

Terrorist and violent extremist groups have been forced to modify their techniques of recruiting, instigation, and glorification of violent actions online, shifting from big worldwide platforms to smaller specialized sites that are less suited to deal with such abuses. 

Large platforms’ increased enforcement and improved technical capabilities in content removal have fuelled this tactical shift, as hosting such content is sometimes explicitly prohibited by local rules.

Identifying and eliminating extremist content has become a daunting chore for these smaller platforms, which are now in the sights.

Google wants to assist. I understand how kind you are.

Jigsaw has responded by coordinating a worldwide network of cross-platform civil society groups to build Altitude.

Altitude, developed in collaboration with Tech Against Terrorism and the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT), is marketed as the only free, open-source, self-hosted tool that provides online platforms with a comprehensive view of potential terrorist and violent extremist content (TVEC) on their sites.

Moderators may access, assess, and remove information detected by trustworthy sources with a few clicks, allowing platforms to make educated and decisive decisions.

Any platform may now use Altitude directly or work with Tech Against Terrorism to embed the tool into their operations, ostensibly to better detect possible risks and manage changing regulations.

This allegedly good effort poses various issues.

While intended as a preventative precaution, the ability to monitor and delete information across platforms is often abused, leading to censorship and the suppression of genuine opposition.

By concentrating authority over what constitutes extremist information, Jigsaw and its partners essentially position themselves as arbiters of reality, with no oversight or responsibility.

Consider a scenario in which Jigsaw’s machine learning algorithms, originally developed to detect and combat extremist content, are repurposed to flag and eliminate any political speech that challenges the existing quo.

Governments might use these methods to stifle activists, journalists, and opposition organizations by branding them as radicals, so justifying censorship and oppression.

In such a world, valid criticism and dissent are suppressed, preventing citizens from holding their leaders accountable or advocating for change.

Some readers with a more negative outlook may argue that this is exactly the point.

Also, investigations have clearly proven that Google has an excessive left-leaning bias, casting doubt on the company’s genuine goals.

While Jigsaw’s disinformation countermeasures are ostensibly intended to improve the dependability of online content, they may also be used to influence narratives and restrict opposing opinions.

Governments and powerful institutions might work with Jigsaw to ensure that only state-approved material is circulated, labeling contrary stories as fake news.

This creates an environment in which the public is given a constant stream of propaganda while having no way to obtain or exchange independent, dissident information.

The risk to privacy is as serious.

Jigsaw’s creation of solutions such as Project Shield, which defends websites against assaults, necessitates extensive monitoring and data collecting.

This infrastructure may be used by governmental entities to undertake mass surveillance on civilians, tracking their internet activity under the pretense of security.

The information gathered may be used to develop extensive profiles of individuals, identifying and targeting those who oppose government policies or take part in political groups.

Jigsaw’s Outline, a tool designed to assist users in avoiding internet restrictions, ironically provides a great template for oppressive governments to increase their control over digital communications.

Understanding and avoiding these techniques allows authoritarian governments to fine-tune their censorship measures, guaranteeing that even the most diligent efforts to obtain free information are foiled.

In essence, Jigsaw’s technologies, disguised as preventive measures, have the potential to build a digital panopticon – a surveillance state in which every online activity and utterance is tracked.

The capacity to rapidly detect and censor undesired information, combined with the ability to mold public conversation through controlled narratives, provides those in power enormous sway over society.

Finally, it is important to recognize the current collaboration between Google and governments, which Jigsaw and Altitude will surely enhance.

The collaboration between these strong groups strengthens their potential to manage information and monitor individuals, thereby eroding individual liberties and privacy.

The accumulation of power made possible by Jigsaw’s technology poses a severe danger to democracy.

The future of free expression and privacy is dependent on our joint vigilance against the intrusion of unrestrained technological power.

Google is not your friend, and Altitude is likely to suffocate free speech.

Source- skynews