State AGs Threaten MySpace
May 15, 2007
There’s something odd with Tuesday’s NYT story. Eight state Attorneys General are upset with MySpace’s failure to go after convicted sex offenders using its service. The AGs:
said the company had not done enough to block sexual predators from the service and had failed to cooperate with the authorities…Officials did not say what actions they would take if MySpace failed to respond adequately by May 29. Mr. Blumenthal said only that all 50 states were behind the letter and that “appropriate actions” against the company were being considered.
The AG complaints contradicts what I have heard privately from a friend in law enforcement, who has told me that MySpace is easy to work with. Donna Rice Huges (yes, that Donna Rice) agrees:
“I haven’t seen in my 12 years of working on these kinds of issues a company jump through as many hoops and respond as quickly and diligently as MySpace,” said Donna Rice Hughes, president of Enough Is Enough, an Internet safety organization.
So is MySpace a bad actor– or might or the AGs be living up to their “Aspiring Governors” tag?
Elsewhere in the “MySpace is dangerous” meme, the Pentagon announced Monday that it would block MySpace and other social networking sites from computers on its network. Good luck.
Entry Filed under: MySpace. .
4 Comments Add your own
Leave a Comment
Some HTML allowed:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <pre> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>
Trackback this post | Subscribe to the comments via RSS Feed
1.
Lucreza Borgia | May 15, 2007 at 11:23 pm
Nice to see that corporations are expected to do the job of parents!!! *rolls eyes*
2.
Ben | May 16, 2007 at 8:01 am
My Neighbor had to register as a sex offender for urinating in public while at fantasy fest in Key West last year. It was a stupid thing to do, but he is a stand up guy – definately not a threat to anyone.
Instead of requiring all sex offender names be sent over to the AGs – why not anyone with a criminal record? I am far more worried my kids meeting drug dealers, gang members, ID theives, violent people, armed robbers… so why not just screen EVERYONE who logs on to one of those networks?
As a matter of fact – we should do the same thing as the sex offender registry, for all criminals… I KNOW my neighbor is a sex offender for urinating in public – but what about the other neighbors I don’t know about?? They could be murders, gang bangers, terrorists, drug dealers, ID Theives – we need a registery for every criminal. Otherwise its discrimination!
Of course we’d have to throw away everyone’s civil rights to do that, but if it means I can sleep better at night, we should do it?
Pfft.
3.
kuma | May 15, 2008 at 6:06 am
so far the question is rather a site on internet knowingly suspect and have information indicating someone might be a sex offender, should the site release such information as alerts or for prosecution for police and courts. i think those indicators that someone is sexually dangerous to other users online in a site might be putting up sexual pictures, uploading obscene pictures, sounds and other visuals and words, conversing sex with underage etc. I think police cannot get access to those information. But the site can remove the person’s membership and participation on the site. It’s only moral and sensible. Make that the company’s guideline, warn the usuers ahead that it’s going to take action.
4.
pat | May 18, 2008 at 8:08 am
what if we make it compulsory for the sites like myspace to put up lists of criminal records already exist in police websites- and have a search and compare system to check the names and pictures of already registered sexual offenders. At least it helps a bit.