Internet ban for sex offenders
2007-03-01 14:06
Trenton, New Jersey - Amid growing concern about child safety on the computer, New Jersey lawmakers are considering a measure to prohibit released sex offenders from using the Internet and to impose new rules for online dating sites.
"We're living in some very scary times," said senate president Richard J Codey, who is spearheading New Jersey's effort.
"No matter how much you trust your kids, no matter how much you think you know what they're doing, there are some sick people out there who will stop at nothing to prey on them."
No federal law imposes Internet restrictions on convicted sex offenders.
Florida and Nevada have laws imposing computer restrictions on sex offenders, but New Jersey's package would mandate five years in jail for released sex offenders caught using a computer to solicit a child.
It would also require online dating sites to tell New Jersey residents whether they do background checks.
The plan is to be considered soon by the state Senate, but already has raised constitutional questions. Internet companies like Yahoo!, AOL, eHarmony and Match.com are also concerned about the online dating rule.
Background checks 'unreliable'
Bill Ashworth, director of state government affairs at Yahoo!, said background checks are unreliable because of fraud and problems getting information from states with different laws on what information is available.
"Criminal background checks provide users of online dating with a false sense of security," he said. "The last thing we want users to do is let their guard down."
A 2000 US Department of Justice survey of youths ages 10 to 17 found that about one in five received a sexual solicitation or approach over the Internet in the prior year. The concern has prompted several states to take steps against child solicitation through the Internet.
Last year, Colorado banned any person from using a computer to talk to an unrelated child under age 15 without parental permission if the person if at least four years older than the child. Kansas and Oklahoma have made electronic solicitation of a child a crime.
Under the New Jersey proposal, convicted sex offenders would have to submit to periodic, unannounced examinations of their computer equipment, install equipment on their computer so its use could be monitored and inform law enforcement if they have access to a computer.
But Parry Aftab, a lawyer, author and executive director of WiredSafety.org, an online safety and education group based in Bergen County, New Jersey, said Internet restrictions for sex offenders may not survive a court challenge. She said the idea makes her "child protection hat conflict with my Internet privacy lawyer hat."
She said keeping sex offenders off the Internet would be difficult to enforce, but that monitoring equipment would help put people back in jail when they violate it. - Sapa-AP
- SAPA