Once in a while, you read a story that is almost impossible to believe. This is one such story. A 14-year old boy (referred to as John) from the U.K. met a 16-year old boy (referred to as Mark) through a chat room under the persona of a 16-year old girl. John eventually created over 6 online personalities that he used to manipulate Mark into thinking that he was being recruited by the British secret service. John also developed an intricate plot that involved Mark needing to prove his secret service abilities by stabbing an assigned target. At this point, John used his female secret agent persona, "Janet" in order to describe the target: a terminally ill boy with brain tumors who desired to die. Although it seems almost too twisted to be true, John wrote himself into the plot as this target (although not terminally ill). "Janet" promised Mark 500,000 pounds and a visit with the Prime minister for committing the murder, as well as a full time position in the British secret service.
John's story was so convincing that he and Mark did meet, and Mark did stab him several times in an attempt to kill him. The police originally thought it was a robbery, and then a case of attempted murder... and then the online relationship(s) were all related back to John's computer and the story was fully uncovered. The 14-year old became the first British citizen to be convicted of inciting his own murder, and the judge presiding over the case commented, "Skilled writers of fiction would struggle to conjure up a plot such as that which arises here."
It becomes incredibly clear that John used the recordlessness, synchronicity, and lack of distribution associated with chat rooms (as defined by the Feature-Based model) in order to enable extensive identity-based deception. John built fictitious characters based on many conventional signals. Conventional signals are low cost displays that are conventionally associated with a characteristic such as stereotyped mannerisms that often imply gender, age or status. Online, conventional signals reign supreme because there are very few assessment signals (costly displays directly related to an individual’s innate characteristics) to ensure that someone is telling the truth.
When this level of deception is incorporated into the formation of an online relationship, things can easily get out of hand. The disinhibitory effects predicted by the Hyperpersonal Model would lead to increased self-disclosure by both John and Mark. This would be due to their increased sense of private-self awareness, and their decreased sense of public self-awareness. However, John’s self-disclosures were fabricated and ultimately spun the relationship out of deception. I think the combination of these two phenomena need to be examined more closely because it seems that the internet is the most common place for truly bizarre interactions to build themselves into a functional and dangerous reality. Relationships built from deception can be negated in FtF because assessment signals are more readily available, but online, relationships built from deception are often able to thrive, and in some cases kill. I only wonder what would have happened if John had not survived his stabbings to confirm that he had fabricated the plot!
3 comments:
Wow, this is one of the more twisted stories I’ve ever heard. I think it’s fascinating (in a sick way) that a 14-year-old boy can do so much damage. This just proves the power of the internet and anonymity, and how easy it is to be deceptive in online spaces. I definitely agree with you in that in this an example of how the hyperpersonal model can work, but I also think it shows a lot of evidence for Wallace’s idea of proximity. Not that it acted as a romantic attraction factor, but it seems that as the intersection frequency of communication between John and Mark increased, the relationship (or perceived relationship between “secret service agents”) grew and became stronger and more tangible to the point that Mark was willing to kill another human being just based on what this person had told him online. Since relationships (of any kind) are more likely to flourish with familiarity (which, online, flows from intersection frequency), the more they interacted, the closer the relationship became between these two boys until it became lethal. Very interesting story – great job relating it back to the theories we’ve studied in class!
Brian,
Crazy story you have here…it’s so disturbing that it’s almost difficult to believe. I really like the analysis you did on this case and I totally agree with how you incorporated the different theories we discussed in class. “Online, conventional signals reign supreme because there are very few assessment signals,” definitely holds true even in the most complex of cases. The only questions I have about the case are how Mark managed to get himself into that situation to begin with. From his point of view, he was being deceived by five separate entities. Though you do build up trust through self-disclosure, how the heck could he have relied on the words of “Janet” and actually attempted to murder someone, let alone a 14 year old boy? I guess that’s more of a psychological question, but still one to consider when thinking about the depths of online deception. Great job with your post! :)
-Kristie
What a terribly interesting story. After reading this all I can say is that this 14 year old must be very intelligent. In essence John engineered a social environment around Mark. It would be difficult to connect six different online personalities in a convincing enough way. The fact that online conversations can be saved and viewed any time makes it a little easier to keep track of what you tell other people. John could have saved his conversations in order to make sure he didn't make any mistakes when using the different personalities. I don't think anyone would go to such extreme lengths to convince someone to kill a person and not expect them to do it. The boy had to have been suicidal. It's twisted that someone would go so far in order to arrange their own murder. Great choice of material for the post, and good job relating things back to the theories from lecture!
Eric
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