RSSAGs Call For Better Age-Verification Methods
By Ed Oswald | Published August 22, 2007, 3:32 PM
Attorneys General across the country banded together Wednesday, calling on social networking sites to strengthen parental controls to keep minors from accessing questionable material on their sites.
The efforts are being headed by Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, who worked previously to get MySpace to disclose the identities of sex offenders on its Web site, and North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper. While both are working to have the companies voluntarily change their policies, they are also pushing for actual laws.
In both states, such bills have been proposed, but failed to pass. Similar efforts have been launched in other states, including Georgia. Efforts at the federal level have also been launched on both sides of the aisle.
So far, the social networking sites are pushing back against any efforts to mandate age validation of their users. Companies say there is no effective way to verify the age of its users or the identity of the person claiming to be an underage user's parent or guardian.
To its credit, MySpace has deleted some 29,000 sex offenders from its site, although it was only those that it could detect through the user giving his or her real name. Other companies, like Facebook, restrict access to high-school based groups once a user turns 18.
However, this is not enough for Blumenthal or the other attorneys general. “"These sites say they want to cooperate, but they have resisted the concept of age or identity verification,” he told the Wall Street Journal.
How about those fingerprint readers? The AG could put fingerprint readers on everybody's PC.
Score: 0
Where's Tipper Gore?
Score: 0
just another plotician shmuck trying to look important and make a name for himself.
nothing new here
Score: 0
Once again, substituting governmental regulation for common sense (provided by parental units) is silly. A small amount of counsel from a concerned parent is worth 20 stupid, unenforceable laws.
Score: 0
OMG THEY GOT OUR PORNZ!
I vote that they have to do retinal scans for id purposes, of course this may lead to people ripping other people's eyes out, though. (only a minor setback... haha, get it minor? god I kill me)
/remember, its only funny until someone gets an eye poked out after that it becomes downright hiliarious
//millions of other issues going on and we need a better age verification system for social networking sites
///god help us all when there is a REAL problem.
////maybe what the AG really needs to do is get better parents?
Score: 0