Andrew O'Hagan's book explores identity in the internet age

📚 Finished reading The Secret Life by Andrew O’Hagan.

The author digs deep into his own somewhat strange and uncanny online-adjacent experiences to produce three lengthy essays on topics that explore the relationship between personal identity and internet life.

It’s not a technical manual. You won’t need to be an internet nerd to enjoy it. it’s much more about the psychology of those who use the internet in ways beyond the norm.

His three autobiographical reports follow firstly his time ghostwriting Julian Assange’s autobiography - he of former Wikileaks fame, latterly - at the time of the story writing - unfortunately perhaps more known for hiding away from rape charges in an Ecuadorean embassy. Or trying to. You might have noticed that you don’t know anyone who’s read such a tome at present.

Secondly, having read about the undercover policemen who used and abused the identity of dead children in order to infiltrate activist groups (and few people’s hearts and homes), the autho sets out to see what it would take for him too to plausibly assume the identity of an unfortunately demised young man.

Lastly we read of his involvement in assembling evidence for and participating in the big reveal of who actually is Satoshi Nakamoto., the accepted-but-unknown inventor of Bitcoin. It seems pretty nailed on for 95% of the tale. But given, famously, we still don’t exactly 100% know who it is, you might realise it doesn’t end entirely simply.

A fascinating and witty read from someone who spends a bit more time with the depths of the internet and those who inhabit them than the average person.