MySpace has found 29000 sex offenders among the social networking site’s users and it will share their profiles with legal bodies.
Two months ago several attorneys general provided a legal document, forcing MySpace to share with sex offenders’ personal profiles, including their home addresses. At that time the site already had detected about 7000 offenders among its 180 million users and removed them from the site.
During July MySpace announced there are about 29000 sex offenders among its users, which is four times more than previously announced 7000. The company didn’t give any explanation about such a big difference between the numbers. Instead, it proudly announced about the good job it has done to protect other users of the site and help attorneys with detecting sex offenders.
"We're pleased that we've successfully identified and removed registered sex offenders from our site and hope that other social networking sites follow our lead," said MySpace chief security officer Hemanshu Nigam.
But attorneys general are surprised with the difference and wonder how it could happen. Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said: “I'm absolutely astonished and appalled because the number has grown so exponentially over so short of time with no explanation."
North Carolina's Roy Cooper is one of attorneys general requesting sex offenders’ personal information. He has also given the idea of parental control of all MySpace’s underage users. He says that every kid must have strong parental control to use the network. Parents should provide with personal data, including credit card information, to let their children register at the network.
MySpace itself should carefully check provided parental data with commercial databases and make sure that the person giving permission is an adult.
"All we're doing is giving parents the right to make a choice whether their children can go online," said Cooper. “The measure would lead to fewer children at risk, because there will be fewer children on those Web sites."
The idea of parental control is not that welcomed by internet companies, but the bill has already passed North Carolina Senate. Later, House subcommittee will consider it. Most internet companies think that parental control will limit freedom of speech. Besides, every child could provide with his or her parents’ data, initiating a false parental permission.
Parental control is not yet approved. But anyway, attorneys general actively cooperate with MySpace to detect sex offenders and make everyone’s web surfing safer. HULIQ
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