Teen Checkup | Internet Safety

South Korea Cracks Down

I wouldn’t advocate the same for America, but South Korea certainly has an interesting way for dealing with bad behavior online.

One of the most striking moments in the MySpace Suicide was when the authorities in Missouri first became aware of all the twisted details that lead to Megan Meier’s death. It is still hard to understand, but there was just no recourse for the State or the people of Missouri. Try as they might, there was just no law on the books that Lori Drew could be charged with. Even when the Federal authorities stepped in the charges they presented were so stretched and convoluted that Drew wasn’t convicted of any Felonies, let alone the murder charges that many people were no doubt hungry for when the case first broke.

For better or worse. I don’t think they would have a similar problem in South Korea. I wanted to blog about this when I first heard a report on BBC radio, but our friends at Net Family News beat me to it.

Wow:

South Korea has cracked down on malicious Internet use, Agence France Presse reports. “South Korean police have rounded up more than 2,000 people for spreading malicious rumours on the Internet during a month-long crackdown sparked by an actress’s suicide,” AFP reports. Eleven people “have been formally arrested and detained for serious legal breaches.” It adds that Korea’s National Police Agency’s cyber-terror prevention centre is asking prosecutors to charge “another 2,019 with various offences,” and the crackdown will continue, AFP adds, referring to the centre’s chief investigator. Charges include libel (about 59% of those arrested), breaching laws on contempt, blackmail, and cyberstalking.

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

The Wrong Reaction To The MySpace Suicide Trial

Yeah, I know, that is a rather strong headline, but when I read articles like the one I found this morning it kind of drives me crazy.

The reactions to the MySpace Suicide trial are really just beginning to trickle in, and it will probably be months before we have a clear understanding of just how the trial - and its verdict - will affect the cyberscape. One thing is for sure: it will.  But how? And will an overreaction for more restrictions and oversight ensure that wrongheadedness wins the day?

The death of Megan Meier was a tragedy, and I devoted nearly twenty posts to her case, her trial and its verdict. But was the vicious cirlce of cyberbullying and suicide that took place in Missouri the fault of MySpace? Some pundits would have you think so.

There is no doubt that cyberbullying is a real phenomenon, and that such behaviors - in extreme cases - may result in tragic ends. However, aren’t the users on a site ultimately the one’s resposible for their own behavior? Aren’t kids who cyberbully guilty of the same kind of juvenile shenanigans as the bully on the playground. Even a grown woman like Lori Drew acted on her own to torment the teen in this case. How can this be the fault of MySpace?

IMHO we live in a culture where people are less and less willing to be accountable for their own actions. These are not values we need to be reinforcing for teens online. The idea that sites like MySpace have to be better police officers in order to protect users from themselves is infuriating and laughable.

But, some people want to turn your social network into a police state:

Online safety expert Linda Criddle says social networks need to take responsibility for activity on their sites and make them safer for consumers, rather than directing blame elsewhere. “I think the industry was hoping there would be a strong verdict blaming one user for abusing another because that way it’s not their fault,” she said.

Criddle said few social networking sites enforce their own terms of service, giving parents a false sense of security when they allow their children to use the sites.

“It’s just the same as if you are at Disneyland and you scream profanities. That is not freedom of speech. You are on Disneyland’s property. You have to follow their terms and conditions. If you don’t, they escort you out of there,” Criddle said. “But these companies claim to have good standards and then do nothing to enforce them. They let people breach their terms and conditions and do nothing about it.”

Read more here.

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

The “Nation” Reacts To MySpace Suicide Trial Decision

I was driving through busy afternoon traffic today just after receiving a phone call from a friend who needed a ride. I was right in the middle of posting more delicious blogs for all of you and was disappointed to have to stop the flow. Luckily, the blog gods were on my side.

On the way, I turned on the radio and caught the beginning of the NPR program, Talk of the Nation. TOTN is a popular show that covers culture from many different angles. One day they are covering the economy, the next day - well, today - they were covering the fallout over the MySpace Suicide trial.

Thank you, oh great ones…

After having picked the details apart on this case - and posting them here for all of you - I felt I had a great handle on all  of this. Actually, I do. There wasn’t anything that came up in the interview that I hadn’t heard before. However, just trying to keep track - even as someone in the know - was making my head spin.  This issue is terribly complicated and its implications are just starting to be understood.

Definitely give this a listen, and check out the page for comments.

Here is a comment left by a TOTN listener:

Yes, the world is full of horrible people. Yes, it’s sad that someone was so depressed that she committed suicide. This could have all been avoided had this girl just stopped communicating with her tormentor.
Unlike school or work where you’re constantly forced to interact with people who might not get along with you, the internet is different. On the social networking sites you do not have to interact with someone just because you’re ‘friends’ with them. You can ignore them, or even better, rescind their invitation to be your friend. If you’re receiving e-mail, delete the messages and then block the sender. Sticks and stones…

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

MySpace, Megan Meier and the Law

I have been browsing great article that was posted on the Wall Street Journal’s Law Blog before the so-called MySpace Suicide case.  This piece brings up a lot of the core issues at the center of this important trial.

Judge George Wu is presiding over the case, and it is interesting to take a look at his decision-making process leading up to the trial. As this post demonstrates, one of the points of the Judges attention before the case got underway was the specifics of the way MySpace’s network equipment actually served the online community of social networkers.

Many of these points are commented on by Dean Stewart, Lori Drew’s defense attorney, who seems more than a little frustrated by what may be a generational gap when it comes to the Judge’s understanding of the social network and its technology.

Check this out:

Why is Judge Wu concerned so much with the technology of MySpace? Probably because a major issue in the case is whether a violation of the MySpace terms of service can trigger the Computer Fraud Abuse Act, the statute that the U.S. Attorney’s office is using to charge Drew.

“I was somewhat disappointed that we plowed a lot of the same ground that we plowed before,” said Steward. “My bet is that we won’t get a decision on the motion before trial.”

Steward said the trial will be in two parts: the legal side, such as what the statute means and whether it can be triggered by violating the terms of service; and the factual side, the tragic death of a 13 year-old girl and the question of who caused it. “But the factual side doesn’t have much bearing on the legal side,” said Steward. “Yet it’s far more important because the legal side” — whether lying online and breaching the terms of service of a Web site can constitute a federal crime — “will affect people all over the country. My prediction is that it goes up to Ninth Circuit no matter what happens.”

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

How Will The Megan Meier Case Affect Your Social Networking?

Now that the Megan Meier/MySpace Suicide case is under way, a number of legal questions have come to light, and some of the answers could affect the way we all network on sites like MySpace and Facebook. One of the biggest challenges the case poses involves the inherent anonymity of the Internet in general, and on social networking sites in particular.

The case against Lori Fields involves her fraudulent use of the MySpace network. Fields has admitted to creating - along with her assistant - “Josh Evans”, the fictitious 16 year old boy who stole Megan Meier’s heart and then - allegedly - drove her to suicide. The use of this false identity is one of the key points that the prosecution is pinning their case to. But what could this ultimately mean? I am friends with the social commentator Camille Paglia on my Facebook page. More to the point, I am friends with “Camille Paglia”, an anonymous fan who has created a page that represents the controversial author. I am also friends with Hunter S. Thompson. Mr. Thompson has been dead for years. What about befriending fictional characters like Bart Simpson or Indiana Jones? What about the habit of law enforcement officers of posing as young children online in order to catch sexual predators?

One of the most fascinating aspects of this case is the way that it is throwing so much of our online behaviors into question, and -although we can’t predict the affects- it is sure that they will be far reaching.

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

Cyberbully Trial Spotlights Cyber Suicide

Although everyone involved in her case agrees that Megan Meier took her own life, committing suicide by hanging, prosecutors have their own version of the events that lead up to Megan’s tragic decision.

According to prosecuting attorney, Thomas O’brien, Megan - who was only 13 years old - killed herself after she had repeatedly received cruel and hurtful messages on her MySpace page. Followers of these posts know that we address cyberbullying quite often. Every now and then I have made reference to a case that involved a suicide. This is that case, and - now that the trial has begun - a number of questions arise for Internet culture in general and social networking in particular.

Prosecutors hope to pin Megan’s suicidal melancholy to the messages that she believed she was receiving from a boy named Josh Evans. In reality, Megan was walking into an emotional cyber-ambush that would - as prosecutors would have their jury believe - lead to Megan hanging herself in a closet using a belt.

So far the trial has already involved a number of emotional testimonies and vivid accounts of the discovery of Megan’s body. Although all of this might sound like a made-for-T.V. thriller, and prosecutors are scoring lots of points connecting the girl’s demise to the cyber-attacks, this is NOT a murder trial. Clearly a suicide CANNOT be a homicide. This is a fraud trial. The prosecution is ultimately trying to nail the defendant for violating MySpace’s terms of use, using a false identity, and specific computer-use fraud legislation that has been successfully utilized to prosecute computer hackers.

Here is another piece about the story. More to come in my upcoming posts!

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

Real Life…Virtually

As I have been keeping up with Internet trends for teens on this site, I have been watching MySpace and Facebook go at it like Ali and Frazier. In fact, both sites are still wildly popular, and social networking shows no signs of disappearing anytime soon. However, when it comes to interacting online, there may be a powerful rival already on the horizon.

Virtual worlds like Second Life have been popular for the last few years, but they have yet to overcome traditional social networking sites as the go-to mode for social interaction among teens. However, if recent trends play out, that could all be changing sooner than later.

Virtual worlds are a natural environment for hard core computer gamers. There is almost no difference between the look and feel of certain massively multi-player online games and the virtual worlds that currently exist. However, most teens aren’t gamers, and the rest of the kid set has been slower to embrace virtual worlds, but they’re coming.

According to stats from last year, the next few years should see more and more young people making the leap into virtual worlds. One reason for this is the fact that the Internet is becoming more and more important to teens. In fact, most kids prefer television to the computer, but most teens would rather be online than watch shows. I’m not totally sold on virtual worlds, but I love the idea of teens leaving the television behind.

Bravo!

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

Are Teens Planning A Facebook Exodus

Many teens have already abandoned MySpace for Facebook. Speaking as a user - although a bit older - of both sites, I can attest to the fact that with all of the ads, spam, and overloaded/user designed profiles, MySpace is nearly impossible to negotiate.

It was a real relief when I started networking on Facebook. Even the new Facebook is WAY better than MySpace, and it’s no wonder that smart teens have already made the move. However, some new evidence shows that teens may be getting ready to abandon Facebook as well.

I just came across an interesting post at Spank, the for-teens-by-teens online magazine. It seems that there may be a mutiny in the works…

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

What Were You Thinking?

As I have written in previous posts, the phenomenon of online predators is greatly misunderstood. One common point of confusion is that any teen with a MySpace page or a Facebook profile is likely to be targeted for some horrible fate. According to my research, this is simply not the case.

At the risk of sounding like I am “blaming the victim” - I’m not - sexual assaults that result from online contact are usually something of a two-way street, involving teens who post inappropriate photos and use sexual language on their sites, in chat rooms, and via email.

Learning that there are teen girls who are willfully posting nude pics and erotic blog entries for all the world to see may seem unfathomable at first, but it is actually an all-too-real phenomenon. Don’t forget, teens may be emotionally immature and socially confused, but many are fully functioning adults when it comes to their bodies. Pair that with the natural “acting out” that comes with this awkward stage of growing up and you have the potential for all kinds of odd, embarrassing behavior.

Check out this post to get inside the minds of teens who are exposing way too much online.

This post was written by: Joe Nolan

Social Networks: Dangerous Territory?

Looks like the White House isn’t a fan of social networking sites.

The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) has released data that reveals how social networking sites can facilitate dangerous behavior among teens, tweens and younger children. This behavior, according to our government, includes drug and alcohol use, self-mutilation, extreme violence, and eating disorders. Their findings also show that parents have no clue about their kids exposure to this stuff online.

ONDCP Director John Walters said, “”Parents read news stories about Internet pedophiles, and they understandably worry about their children being exposed to online pornography. But they may not be aware how pervasive this content is, and how young the children are who are being exposed to this for the first time.”

Walters also went on to say that it was time for parents to “upgrade” their parenting skills.

Hmmm. Should I take offense?

Yes, parents need to monitor their children when they’re on the Internet. Yes, parents must also be familiar with the technology their teens are using. But, honestly, parents know their children better than any government official. Parents know how to follow their instinct - myself included.

Kids will be kids. Let them explore a little on the Internet… and let us have faith that they’ll know right from wrong.  Seriously. It’s not like they haven’t heard about these dangerous behaviors at school.

Think about it. We were all exposed to this stuff back in school - well before the Internet - and most of us turned out fine. Our kids will be too.

Taking away Myspace and Facebook from our teens would be a big, big mistake.

This post was written by: Erin