5 Comments »According to Reuters, the New Jersey State Attorney General has subpoenaed Facebook to investigate whether or not sexual offenders in the state currently have profiles on the site. This comes on the heels of statements by the New York state Attorney General “claiming that an undercover investigation revealed that investigators posing as young users of the site (12 to 14 years old) were ‘repeatedly solicited by adult sexual predators.’” (Source: News.com) Apparently this subpoena “is similar to one issued earlier this year to MySpace.”
Based on all this buzz surrounding sexual predators on Facebook, I would say that being naked on Facebook is probably not a great idea. At least if you are under age. According to the article, 268 registered New Jersey sex offenders has profiles on MySpace and had since been deleted. I wonder what number will show up on Facebook. Looks like Facebook needs to get the P.R. machine running full-time. Everyone remembers all the buzz surrounding MySpace and sexual predators. It looks like Facebook is now the new site to receive the same negative buzz.
If there is a public database of registered sex offenders, Facebook and other social networks should simply query that database when people sign up for the site. If there is a match, the profile gets flagged for immediate review. Do you think this is a good solution?
No, it's a very bad solution, for the same reasons the No Fly list and the No Credit lists cause vast amounts of inconvenience to anyone whose name even partially matches the ostensibly “guilty” person.
A sex offender (remember how broad that category is) ought to have the same right to innocuously use Facebook as anyone else does. The same way they may buy bread from the 7/11, or drive on the road, or use the telephone network. Any problem deriving from a sex offender using Facebook would be due to their commission of some kind of offensive or annoying behavior through a Facebook service, and at that time it would be appropriate to suspend or ban them. No complaint, no suspension.
Facebook ought not set itself up as a judge of its users' personal morality prior or external to any use of Facebook's facilities. Persons convicted of fraud probably pose a greater danger, especially fraud perpetrated on friends and family, and no-one's talking about that.
It's Facebook's responsibility to follow up on complaints it has received, not to pre-emptively try to match its databases with governmental databases. If jurisdictions want to forbid sex offenders (or other categories of offenders, although again, sex offenders seem to be the only ones brought up in this context) from using Facebook, they certainly can, and if the offender is discovered breaching this condition, they can be punished for it.
It's not just unnecessary for the Facebook company to try to do this, it's actually stupid.
No, it’s a very bad solution, for the same reasons the No Fly list and the No Credit lists cause vast amounts of inconvenience to anyone whose name even partially matches the ostensibly “guilty” person.
A sex offender (remember how broad that category is) ought to have the same right to innocuously use Facebook as anyone else does. The same way they may buy bread from the 7/11, or drive on the road, or use the telephone network. Any problem deriving from a sex offender using Facebook would be due to their commission of some kind of offensive or annoying behavior through a Facebook service, and at that time it would be appropriate to suspend or ban them. No complaint, no suspension.
Facebook ought not set itself up as a judge of its users’ personal morality prior or external to any use of Facebook’s facilities. Persons convicted of fraud probably pose a greater danger, especially fraud perpetrated on friends and family, and no-one’s talking about that.
It’s Facebook’s responsibility to follow up on complaints it has received, not to pre-emptively try to match its databases with governmental databases. If jurisdictions want to forbid sex offenders (or other categories of offenders, although again, sex offenders seem to be the only ones brought up in this context) from using Facebook, they certainly can, and if the offender is discovered breaching this condition, they can be punished for it.
It’s not just unnecessary for the Facebook company to try to do this, it’s actually stupid.
I couldn't agree more with DCG! Sex offenders, regardless of past wrongs, are people too. Anyone who is free from prison and complying with their parole has paid a debt to society and may now attempt to resume a normal life.
I couldn’t agree more with DCG! Sex offenders, regardless of past wrongs, are people too. Anyone who is free from prison and complying with their parole has paid a debt to society and may now attempt to resume a normal life.
[...] if it turned out that a bunch of unsavory individuals were hanging about. AllFacebook’s Nick O’Neill recalls, “Everyone remembers all the buzz surrounding MySpace and sexual predators. It [...]