I haven't seen that John Oliver talk you mentioned, so keep that in mind.
That being said, in response to your hypothetical situation, if people were forced to identify themselves, I don't think we'd see nearly as many incidents of 'hacking' and so on (but perhaps more issues with stolen identities?). However, it's sort of the "nuke everything" method of criminal deterrence in my mind. For example, if the government were to put cameras into every room of every home, I imagine there would be a LOT less crime in general, but I think the quality of life would be so much lower that any benefits in crime levels would be quickly negated.
Besides, it's very rare to be truly anonymous on the internet - just look at the efforts people make with TOR and VPNs, and how even those methods aren't perfectly anonymous.
I haven't seen that John Oliver talk you mentioned, so keep that in mind.
That being said, in response to your hypothetical situation, if people were forced to identify themselves, I don't think we'd see nearly as many incidents of 'hacking' and so on (but perhaps more issues with stolen identities?). However, it's sort of the "nuke everything" method of criminal deterrence in my mind. For example, if the government were to put cameras into every room of every home, I imagine there would be a LOT less crime in general, but I think the quality of life would be so much lower that any benefits in crime levels would be quickly negated.
Besides, it's very rare to be truly anonymous on the internet - just look at the efforts people make with TOR and VPNs, and how even those methods aren't perfectly anonymous.