Last year, both MySpace and Facebook pledged to increase security on their respective sites in response to public criticism that online social networking sites don’t do enough to protect their users.
MySpace took its first major step Feb. 3, announcing it would boot 90,000 convicted sexual offenders from its site.
Even with MySpace’s move, legal authority over a sexual offender’s Internet use is limited, said Andrea Schlesinger, Lane County’s parole and probation supervisor.
“Just because we can monitor convicted offenders who are on parole or probation doesn’t mean we have the legal authority to watch everything they do,” Schlesinger said. “Unfortunately, our authority is based on what the court order says, and that varies greatly depending on the offender.”
Sometimes, Schlesinger said, law enforcement officers will install software that tracks the Internet sites an offender views on his or her computer. Other times, the entire computer will be confiscated. Such measures, however, depend on the amount of evidence suggesting offenders are violating the guidelines of their specific court orders.
“It depends on the background of the offender in question,” Schlesinger said. “If this is an offender who has a history of using the Internet to practice their deviant behavior, then it’s more likely their court order sets restrictions on Internet use.”
Vi Beaty, Oregon State Police sexual offender registry manager said that unless they’re classified as a predator, once offenders are off parole the degree to which their activity is monitored depends on the resources available to the local law enforcement agency.
“Technology is so much further advanced than the ways law enforcement can manage it,” Beaty said. “For example, I’m not sure if there’s any way to track an offender who is using multiple names to access various sites.”
University media law professor Kyuho Youm said MySpace’s recent decision to expel offenders was most likely based on public image. If the company had rejected the request to increase security, Youm said users would have been more likely to question what exactly the network has to hide.
“The revolution of cyber technology is almost mind-boggling,” Youm said. “The question of leeway with anonymity online is balanced with the reality that some people are exploiting their anonymity. This fact makes people more willing to allow the government to step in for protection.”
Students should also take personal steps concerning safety online, Schlesinger said. Although the majority of sexual offenders are not classified as “predatory,” Schlesinger said the most dangerous offenders prowl the Internet looking for someone to victimize. The more information a student provides, the higher the probability that such a person can find you, Schlesinger said.
“People who commit sexual crimes are very good at making things appear rosy,” she said. “If any situation seems too good to be true, you really need to be careful.”
To protect herself online, University sophomore Kristin Rossman said she makes her Internet profile private and never posts information such as a phone number. However, University freshman Brad Nelson said the nature of the Internet makes it difficult to track people who might misuse such information.
“I definitely think MySpace and Facebook should do as much as they can to monitor who is on their sites,” Nelson said. “At the same time, however, they can’t control everything that happens online.”
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MySpace revamps digital safeguards against sexual offenders
Daily Emerald
February 10, 2009
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