Physical and digital spaces of expanding darkness: Sociospatial (counter)practices

Abstract

<p>Darkness is often associated with criminal activities, where for example environmental crime prevention identifies blind spots, or hidden, isolated, dark places as the ones where illegal practices (e.g. drug dealing, or assaults) may be more easily carried out in urban areas. Similarly, the so-called dark web is frequently identified as the ideal host of cybercriminal practices, such as the sharing of illicit materials. However, increasingly so, physical and digital ‘dark spaces’ are also becoming places of resistance against everyday life’s forced datafication and data extraction. For example, the dark web browser Tor guarantees anonymity and untraceability of internet activities; in physical spaces, non- or less datafied places are sought, such as forests, urban parks, or even libraries. Places where the smartphone may be switched off, and surveillance and dataveillance resisted. Following critical data studies and feminist digital geographies, this paper thus challenges the association between darkness and criminality, between digital invisibility and moral and legal transgression. It asks: How can the physical and digital darkness support sociospatial practices of resistance against datafication? What are these practices made of? To address these questions, the paper reflects on secondary literature examining spaces of data resistance, data activism, and data (in)justice. Resulting reflections show that, while datafied, digital life remains largely prevalent, a desire to move from sociospatial hypervisibility to reduced visibility or darkness is emerging.</p>