Hackers and political will

On a stand-alone basis, their act sufficed to stir but when hackers calling themselves Anonymous Philippines defaced some of the nation’s important websites over the weekend, they just gave all the more reason for the government to implement the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012.

Their ground was there, directly perceptible and beautifully enchanting. People were made to believe the new law is evilly ominous to our freedom of expression. It incited people to the impression that anyone who “commits libel either by written messages, comments, blogs, or posts in sites such as Facebook, Twitter, or any other comment-spaces of other social media in the Internet” can typically be imprisoned.

And so it doesn’t ring a bell to me why ordinary Internet users seem to have favored the hackers’ drama. I believe these hackers and other professionals of the online community are in a collective struggle to displace the law or revise it at least. But looking beyond the exteriors of it, beyond all their well-done script and unquestionable skills in hacking, there’s actually nothing more to what they did than just a mere show of spite.

I don’t know if there was anything that could justify them staging one show of dissent at the expense of public convenience. In my notes, this thing they did was tantamount to a street demonstration, which requires them to secure a permit before so doing. But we are dealing with ghosts here and most of us don’t understand the language by which these dark warriors operate. What we can freely do, however, is to scrutinize the foundation of their “online” rally. Here’s my take:

Under the Revised Penal Code, libel has long been considered a crime against honor. And although I’m one of those who vehemently abhor Sen. Sotto’s alleged acts of plagiarism, I’m very much in favor of his added provision that seeks to criminalize online libel as well for the exact reason why an ordinary libel is considered a crime. That’s why I can’t understand why some see it as a peril to their freedom when what it does is secure and protect the defamed person’s rights only. If you don’t want to be imprisoned, then watch your words.

Time and again, we should know that even in a democratic country like ours, rights are not borderless. With the freedom to say something comes the responsibility to say it truthfully and justly. Oh well, when ever has someone been imprisoned for saying the truth, generally speaking? The law, notwithstanding the separate constitutional assurance to a due process and all, does not restrict us in saying something online, only that it sets the demarcation line between what’s truthful and honorable to what’s lie and unprincipled claim. Say, a tit for a tat.

That’s why I call this a desperate attempt by desperate people who want to place the rule of law in their hands. And there could have been nothing so off beam with the way they put it up if not for the tactic they employed. The channeling (hacking government websites) of their grievances was just utterly poor! Not to mention, very belligerent. Again, there’s nothing completely wrong with expressing dissenting views on a matter involving the nation’s political plight but there are proper venues for that, in some other place where innocent people are not implicated. Obviously, their act left people accessing these websites in good faith hanging by a moment and stopped short whatever official transactions they had just to give way for such a selfish protest.

This now leaves our government, especially politicians planning for a reelection bid, in a quite perplexed situation. With the hackers only a click away from their next attack and their threats of hacking disseminated everywhere online, their “whatever” cause might just get across to the Congress in time.

Especially for those who voted for the law, the next days might be days of political will.