by Anne Collier
NetFamilyNews.org

Parents, don’t just talk with your kids about social networking – chat sites and instant messaging really need to be in the conversation too. Despite the news media’s focus on social-networking sites as the locus of online child exploitation, it turns out chat sites and instant-messaging are where most sexual solicitation and cyberbullying is happening. But even in those “places” online, “only 15% of children [aged 10-15] experience unwanted sexual solicitation and only a third report being harassed online,” reports HealthDay News, citing a new study in Pediatrics. Here’s the difference found between social sites and IM or chat: 4% of the nearly 1,600 children surveyed “reported experiencing an unwanted sexual solicitation and 9% reported being harassed while on a social networking site. Solicitations were reported 59% more often in instant messaging and 19% more often in chat rooms than social networking sites.

More surprising, harassments were reported 96% more often in instant messaging than in social networking sites,” say the study’s authors – Michele Ybarra of Internet Solutions for Kids and Kimberly Mitchell of the University of New Hampshire – in the study’s press release. Their advice for parents: “Internet safety is not just about whether your child is on MySpace or not. You should know what your children are doing on MySpace and Facebook. But you also need to know what your children are doing in school, after school, at parties, at the mall, online – basically all environments in which they engage

by Larry Magid
Feb 4, 2008

The case of Megan Meier screams out for justice. But to be truly served, justice must based on rationality, not just revenge and emotion. It was disclosed in November that the 14-year-old Missouri girl committed suicide after an adult neighbor – the mother of one of Megan’s friends – allegedly carried out a cruel hoax. That mother, Lori Drew, reportedly set up a fake MySpace profile that appeared to belong to a hot-looking teenage boy named Josh Evans. The fake “Josh” initially befriended Megan but later cruelly told her he didn’t want to be friends with her. Megan, who had a history of taking antidepressant medication, responded by hanging herself.

She isn’t the first child to take her own life as a result of cyberbullying, but this case is bizarre in that the main perpetrator was an adult mom rather than a fellow teenager. Drew’s purpose in helping to create the fake profile was reportedly to determine whether Megan had said mean things about Drew’s own daughter.

No charges were filed against Drew. In announcing his decision not to prosecute, Charles County, Mo., prosecutor Jack Banas said, “There’s no way that anyone could know that talking to someone or saying that you’re mean to your friends on the Internet would create a substantial risk.”

That decision prompted outrage from Megan’s parents and many others.
Officials from Megan’s town of Dardenne Prairie wasted no time unanimously passing a statute that makes Internet harassment a local misdemeanor.

Others have called for state and federal legislation to make it a crime to post comments anonymously or under an assumed identity. While I understand the intentions behind the proposed legislation, I worry about such laws in the hands of overzealous prosecutors. What concerns me is the knee jerk reaction to a tragic but extremely infrequent occurrence.

The Megan Meier case, according to Nancy Willard, author of the book “Cyberbullying and Cyberthreats” is exceptionally rare. “The vast majority of situations involve teens harassing or bullying other teens.”

The case reminds me how many in the media, along with lawmakers and regulators, reacted to the handful of Internet predator cases reported over the past couple of years. A couple of tragic cases prompted attorneys general from several states to threaten lawsuits against MySpace, Facebook and other social networking sites. There have been media reports about an “epidemic” of predator attacks, yet very few substantiated cases.

Congress held numerous hearings, including one heavily publicized Senate Judiciary committee meeting last fall where teenage victim Alicia Kozakiewicz testified that “the boogey man is real. And he lives on the Net – he lived in my computer and he lives in yours. While you are sitting here, he is at home with your children.”

I don’t blame Alicia for saying those words. She suffered terrible atrocities at the hands of a brutal rapist. But what happened to her was extremely unusual. In the vast majority of cases, sexual perpetrators and their teenage victims know each other from the offline world. And in the few Internet related exploitation cases we do know about, the teen engaged in some form of risky behavior.

Cyberbullying is not so rare but as we combat the problem, we need to approach it with some common sense. Studies from both the Pew Internet & American Life Project and the University of New Hampshire Crimes Against Children Research Center have shown that about one-third of teens have been victims of cyberbullying and an equal number have bullied or harassed others.

What we need is a national school-based education program that targets this problem head on. Technology experts, psychologists, police, teachers and – most of all – teens themselves need to work together to make it clear to teens that bullying, whether in person or online, is unacceptable and may be dangerous.

Kids need to know it’s not cool to act as co-dependents to bullies; if they see it, they should intervene. And everyone needs to be aware that bullying can sometimes lead to tragedy, as in the case of young Megan or 13-year old Ryan Halligan, who took his own life in 2003 after being bullied by classmates.

As we begin a national discussion about bullying and harassment, it’s important that we avoid unintended consequences.

We need to be careful to draw the line between harmful harassment and constitutionally protected speech. Just as in the fight against terrorism, those lines can easily be blurred.

SafeKids.com is an internet safety site run by technology journalist Larry Magid.

By Larry Magid

When it comes to Internet safety, the basic advice pretty much the same even though the technology keeps changing. Avoid giving out too much personal information in public places, be very careful before getting together with people you meet online and never say anything on the Internet that you wouldn’t want your grandmother, employer or your current or future love interest to see. That advice has long applied to e-mail, chat and social networking and now it can be applied to video sharing sites as well.

Let me start out by saying that I’m a big fan of video uploading sites. I’ve seen some incredibly creative videos from people of all ages, including children. I think it’s terrific that many kids today are video-literate – able to communicate in a medium once reserved for highly trained professionals with expensive equipment. It’s also a way that young and old can have an impact on their world. Videos posted on public sites have already had an impact on elections and public opinion. They’re good for our democracy.

Still, there needs to be some commonsense rules of conduct. Aside from the obvious – avoid pornography, hate speech and spewing out all sorts of personal information – there are more subtle ways to get in trouble. When it comes to privacy, be aware of what’s in the scene that you’re recording. Posters on your wall, photos on a shelf, school or team t-shirts people are wearing, address signs in front of a house or car license plate numbers can reveal your identity. Be especially conscious of videos depicting children. Be aware of what you and others are saying on the sound track and be respectful of the privacy rights other others who might be in your video. If you are taping in a public place, be sure to ask permission before including bystanders in the video and never take video of other people’s children without permission. And even then, you should think carefully about any publically posted video that depicts children.

As with anything you post on the net, think about the implications of what you are doing, how you’re dressed and what you are saying. Would you feel comfortable showing this video to your boss or a potential employer, a relative or your future mother or father-in law? Be aware that anything you post on the Internet should be considered permanent. Even if you later delete it, there is a chance that it’s been copied, forwarded or reposted. Besides, there are archives that can hang on to web material even after it’s been taken down.

And don’t think someone needs a camcorder to record video. Most cell phones and still cameras are also now video recorders. Be aware that when someone brings out a cell phone, they could be using it as a camera or camcorder. That’s why some health clubs ban them for use in locker rooms. I’m not saying that we need to be paranoid but about anything that has a lens in it but we do need to be aware that there are cameras all around us and we need to use those devices responsibly.

Be a good citizen. It’s your right to express your point of view and even make fun of public officials or policies but don’t be mean or nasty, especially when it comes to people who aren’t in the public eye. You can be held legally responsible if you slander, liable or defame someone.

Most video sites have terms of service that you must adhere to. YouTube’s terms are posted in its “Code of Conduct” link at the bottom of each page. As you might expect, the site prohibits pornography and sexually explicit content and the company reports incidents of child exploitation to law enforcement. The company also bans videos depicting dangerous or illegal acts “like animal abuse, drug abuse, or bomb making.” There is of course “zero tolerance” for predatory behavior, stalking and harassment as well as revealing other people’s personal information. The company doesn’t permit hate speech or “malicious use of stereotypes.” Crackle.com – Sony’s new incarnation of the old Grouper — says it succinctly by banning videos that are “defamatory, vulgar, pornographic, obscene, libelous, invasive of another’s privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically, or otherwise objectionable.”

Kids should be warned to avoid video bullying. Creating a video that makes fun of or ridicules another person can be extremely hurtful. This and other forms of cyber bullying are a growing problem on the Internet that affects many children and teens.

Parents should also be aware of what their kids are viewing on video sharing sites. Even though most of the major sites prohibit pornography and gratuitous violence, there are videos that are not suitable for younger children and there are some sites that do permit sexually explicit or other views that may be inappropriate for children or teens. As with all media, parental discretion is not only advised – it’s a necessary part of parenting.

All reputable video sharing sites prohibit the unauthorized use of copyrighted material. That of course means that you can’t rip-off segments from TV shows or movies but it can have broader implications such as the use of musical sound tracks in videos. Last month the Electronic Frontier Foundation (eff.org) sued Universal Music Publishing Group because the company successfully demanded that YouTube remove a short video that a mother posted of her son dancing to a Prince song. That’s a bit extreme – hence the EFF’s lawsuit – but it does illustrate the need to at least be aware of ways you can get on the wrong side of the copyright police.

by Anne Collier
NetFamilyNews.org

Two high school students and a 19-year-old “ringleader” advertised themselves as “party girls” available as a threesome in an online classifieds sites, the Pioneer Press reports , citing an FBI investigation. The 19-year-old “was arrested by the FBI last month and charged in US District Court with sex trafficking of minors, a federal offense.” The Pioneer Press adds that the case is just the “latest in the Twin Cities involving sex rings” using free online classifieds to advertise; “but this time, the participants are minors.” These teens fit the profile of online teens most at risk for sexual exploitation (see the profile). The Press adds that investigators are debating whether teen prostitution is on the rise because the Internet, but “the majority of juvenile prostitutes is still thought to be runaways, illegal immigrants and children from poor urban areas. But an August 2003 Newsweek exposé examined the increase of juvenile sex workers in suburbs. The story focused on a Twin Cities girl from an affluent home who relished the fast cash and picked up men at the Mall of America.”

By Anne Collier
NetFamilyNews.org

Four percent of US online youths have been asked to send sexually explicit photos of themselves over the Net, and about 1.5% have done so, the Associated Press reports, citing a new study by the Crimes Against Children Research Center. That’s not just extremely unwise; those photos could be considered illegal child pornography, distribution of which is a federal crime. One of the study’s authors, Kimberly Mitchell, told the AP that kids need to know this. “Mitchell said kids also may not be aware of how quickly such photos can circulate, mistakenly thinking the image is only for the personal use of the requester,” according to the AP. Here are the conditions that she and her co-authors identified as making kids more likely to receive these requests for explicit photos of themselves: “having a close relationship with someone known only online; talking with someone online about sex or having a sexually suggestive screen name; and experiencing physical or sexual abuse offline.” The study, which is being published this week in the Journal of Adolescent Health, is an analysis of data from a 2005 phone survey of 1,500 Net users aged 10-17, the AP reports (its authors said the numbers could be higher now, with greater use of camera phones, Web cams, and other digital-photo devices). The study’s margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.