I was goofing off at work last week when this guy called. Told me that the registration info for the site I work on was all messed up. That perhaps we ought to check on that. I told him to talk to a technology guy on the fifth floor. Gave the caller the correct extension.

Up to this point he sounded sane. Remember that.

After the caller got the number he wanted, he proceeded to explain to me how the Internet really worked. How all of those companies that now sell "dot com" addresses were all CIA fronts. In fact, the computer department in every university in the U.S. and Canada (this guy said he was from Montreal; he certainly did have a McKenzie brothers accent) was a CIA front. And, just to be on the safe side, the "ostensible" U.S. government was a front for the CIA and the NSA.

The National Security Agency is weird outfit, I'll admit, and folks as mainstream as George McGovern have spoken out against it as something of a totalitarian enterprise. But then the caller got weird.

He told me about how, since he'd started writing his book, Rupert Murdoch was personally spying on him. That two Montreal detectives watched his every move. "They're right outside my window. I just waved at them and they waved back," he told me breathlessly over the phone. And, most importantly, every known spy agency and hacker in the world was trying to break into his computer. Since my company had pinged him a few times, he figured that meant we were a CIA plant as well. In fact, if our technology guy couldn't come up with some good answers, we'd go down in his book as such.

I don't care one way or the other about the company where I work. If the New York Times published a story listing my employer as a CIA front I wouldn't bat an eyelash. But the caller and his enthusiastic paranoia fascinates me. He honestly believes that the CIA is tracking the moves of every person on the Internet. He seems to believe that this is even possible. He also seems to believe that the book he is writing--he doesn't even have a contract on it, mind you, he's just writing--has gotten the rich and powerful organized into a vendetta against him.

What a cool dude!

I generally dismiss conspiracy theories by stating that people are too stupid to actually carry them out. In this case, though, there is an even better rebuttal: It's not possible. Period.

Any acquaintance of mine will readily testify that I've got a healthy ego, but there's no way I'd even imagine the CIA wanting to get into my computer on the basis of my asking a few questions. Certainly, if there were police detectives on my trail, it would have to be for something other than writing a book. And as for the CIA actually tracking the Internet, well, it's just not possible. Even if there was a computer filtering all the traffic (a preposterous concept, something that would shut traffic down immediately), human analysts would have to look over the data. If every person employed by all governments (local, state and federal) were on the job watching traffic, the CIA still wouldn't have enough manpower for the task.

Yeah, there are security issues with the Internet. Events of the last few weeks have highlighted some of the problem areas. And I've had some experience. My e-mail address has been passed along to hundreds of spammers. Occasionally something happens to my computer that may or may not have had something to do with a virus. But that's why I don't keep anything sacrosanct on my computer, and also why I back up often. If someone wants a copy of a half-finished book, bully for them. If they want to see how bad I am at playing Madden 2000, by all means hack away. And if they snag my credit card number from a cookie, well, they do. That's why I pay for stuff online with a credit card. I have protection. I'm on the hook for $50, but nothing more, if my number is stolen. So far, no one has grabbed it.

There are a lot of holes in the Internet, places where people looking to make a shady buck hang out. There are a few malevolent types who just want to wreak havoc. But most of the folks cruising around in cyberspace are just ordinary folks, people looking for some info, something to buy or a good time. And they meet up with other people offering exactly those things.

I guess we could just wall ourselves off from the Internet and live in fear of the boot coming down to squash us. Or we could simply stride out confidently and face whatever comes our way.

Kinda like, you know, the choices we make every day in the real world.

Jon Worley doesn't spend much time online when he's not at work.