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Danger in a virtual world
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They are also likely to have been enraged by the sheer callousness of the person who, having befriended her, fed this hapless lady with tales of woe which engaged her growing sympathy and led her in the end to borrow from friends in a soft-hearted attempt to help him out of his purported financial troubles.
In some ways it is an old, old story, but in another, crucial sense it is one which could have happened only in this century. For the cautionary tale of Mrs B was an online tragedy. Her predator was able to gain access to her emotions and then to her purse by skilfully manipulating a relationship which required no meetings, no human contact and no basis in truth or reality. He was a fantasy figure, free to concoct whatever stories he wished thanks to the internet’s unique, and sometimes chilling, combination of intimacy and anonymity.
Posing as a US Army colonel, he was apparently able to hoodwink Mrs B because she was an innocent abroad in a baffling new digital landscape. As well as evoking sympathy, her plight therefore acts as a reminder that, for all its benefits, the digital revolution is also bringing with it a number of new dangers for the unwary.
Mrs B was undoubtedly foolish and the money – made up of her own savings and loans from friends – is unlikely to be seen again. Few people are going to gamble £30,000 on a virtual relationship with a person they have never met, but who among us has not experienced some permutation of anxiety, confusion and ineptitude when getting to grips with the online world? And her age is incidental. Internet idiocy in some form can strike anyone at any age and Mrs B, who happens to be 70, happened to suffer a particularly bad case.
Like the recent controversy over the libelling of Lord McAlpine, the story of Mrs B has served the salutary purpose of drawing timely new attention to the many ways in which the internet and social media can be abused by those who seek to circumvent or break the law or, as in the case of some online commentators, who wish to kid themselves that terrestrial rules do not apply in a virtual world.
We are only just beginning to understand the possible implications of the new communications technology now making its way into every home. They range from desocialised children, institutionalised loneliness and emotional detachment to identity theft, copyright piracy, the malicious proliferation of phony ‘facts’ and, we may safely bet, ever more sophisticated fraud of all kinds.
Digital technology is undoubtedly the road ahead, but it also something of a minefield which, it becomes ever more apparent, will need some clearer warning signs as more and more people join it.
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