My Space refuses to turn over names of sex offenders online praying on our children....?

Question

What are your thoughts, do you agree with them or do you think they should do more to protect our children?

Prying.. sorry!

Answer 1

MySpace wasn't started as a chat room for children. It started as a place for independent bands to advertise themselves.

MySpace has rules in place to keep children safe, if they choose to use them. To begin with, no one under 14 is *supposed to* sign up there. Of course, there is no way to verify that, besides *PARENTS* monitoring *THEIR CHILDRENS* behavior & activity on-line in the same way that they would in the real world.

Also, members can set their pages to 'private' so that only known 'friends' can view them. Again, the member's safety & security is up to the member (and their PARENTS if they are under 18).

And, of course, the member (and their PARENTS) can keep actual private, identifying information about themselves off of the internet, in order to keep themselves safe.

MySpace is a private company, offering webspace in exchange for either membership fees or advertising revenue. I can't think of a single reason why a sex offender who has served their time shouldn't be able to use that service in a legal manner, if they are not restricted from doing so as a provision of their parole.

Answer 2

MySpace is making a difficult decision, but I think they're probably making the right one. As scary as it is to think that there might be unknown predators on MySpace, the consequences of releasing the names might be even worse.

First of all, the release of the names might cause a lot of trouble for MySpace in the form of privacy lawsuits. MySpace has to protect itself, as well as the rights of the sex offenders. Whether or not you agree with those rights, MySpace is obligated to protect them as they are defined by current US laws and statutes.

Secondly though, so long as MySpace doesn't PUBLISH the information, it seems to me they have a better chance of keeping track of it. If MySpace let it be known that they would give out publicly the names of sex offenders on their website, every single offender would very suddenly have a different name and profile. But, by keeping the information secret MySpace encourages the users to maintain their true identities, which can be tracked.

It's a hard decision, and I'm not sure I like the fact that they had to make it the way they did, but I think MySpace is making the only decision they could have made. Of course MySpace doesn't want to help predators, so clearly they didn't have much choice in this matter.

Answer 3

Wait a minute. These people probably are trying to lure kids; but they haven't committed a crime until they actually do something. They have served their sentence and have been released.

The way you protect your kids is to be a good parent. That means among other things preventing your child from wasting their time on things like MySpace. This site has NO educational or social value. It is full of kids discussing drug use, their sexual activities, and gossip. This is NOT a site any parent should let a child use! Wake up people - being a parent doesn't mean buying a TV and a computer and then leaving your kid alone in their room to get on with it. You are supposed to be there to supervise and teach. You are not the child's friend; you are their guardian and mentor. Get with the program!

And no, I don't want the government getting information just because it asks for it. MySpace complies with any legal order, but does not volunteer private information to government agencies - that's exactly how they should behave.

Answer 4

I think the names of all sex offenders should be published or if MySpace finds out the person is a sex offender they should pull their account. It would be really hard though. Many sex offender probation sentences make using the internet illegal for the offender, meaning if they are caught going online by their probation officer they could get put in jail. However that does not stop them from opening accounts in different names, using friends computers, or going to the library and use our tax money to fund their prowling.

I think MySpace should withdraw the account of anyone using the site improperly to better safeguard our children.

Parents you should put restrictions onto what sites your children can access.

If MySpace continues to do this we should boycott them or get this knowledge out to the media.
There is a show where they use actors posing as under age kids to catch predators.

Answer 5

Honestly on my personal opinion on sex offenders in very very bad. I think my space should let the whole world know who these sick jerk-offs are and not just that but have poster boards of these people everywhere so people can know who they are. I don't believe that we would be violating their rights in to many ways since they violate to many peoples and threaten them not to say anything.

Answer 6

I think they should be compelled to turn over the names because my space was started as a chat room for children. It should also be made to not allow anyone 18+ to be able to set up their spaces and not be able to engage in the on line chat room. There are plenty of spaces for adults, let the children have this area and be protected from pedophiles.

Answer 7

Your question appears to be a misnomer! How could they be praying in the act of commiting such heinous crimes! Perhaps you mean prying!

Answer 8

I totally disagree witht hem...if our children are in danger b/c of these creeps then we have the right to know!!!

Answer 9

they should protect more...i dont think sex offender should even have access to innternet..or a computer

Answer 10

they are pullin profiles...they cannot just hand over names therehttp://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/05/16/myspace.sex.offenders.ap/index.html is a process