When MySpace recently announced the site had found 29,000
registered sex offenders among its members, most people
who care about kids were shocked. I wasn't.
I was dismayed, of course. MySpace, the Internet's best-known
social networking site, is extremely popular with teens.
And the thought of so many predators who want to harm kids…well,
it's pretty scary to think about how much access to kids'
lives a site like MySpace offers. But that big number with
all those zeroes really shouldn't seem like news.
In fact, many experts, myself included, have been warning
parents for years that MySpace and other social networking
sites are virtual smorgasbords for sexual predators. Therefore,
it should come as no surprise that MySpace is filled with
exactly the sort of people we keep away from kids in the
real world.
There's an even more shocking thought behind that 29,000,
because that number only counts MySpace members who are
registered sex offenders using their real names. Think of
all the sexual predators using aliases. Think about the
ones who haven't been caught or convicted. Their names aren't
on any list. And MySpace has no way of knowing who they
are or what they'll try to do to kids.
The reason MySpace would seem like a buffet to a sexual
predator is the same reason kids love online social networks:
access to personal information. Kids love telling the world
about themselves, and that's exactly what they do on MySpace.
Unfortunately, personal information is the favorite tool
of the sexual predator. You have to understand that the
tactics these people use aren't obvious. They never start
with sexual talk. Instead, sexual predators attempt to build
relationships with kids using flattery, conversation and
shared interests. Later on, when they have established trust,
the sexual predator shifts the focus to sexual matters and
in-person meetings.
MySpace offers the perfect environment for slowly building
such relationships. As I've discussed in previous columns,
people often do things - like offering information or expressing
feelings - in the virtual world that they wouldn't do in
a face-to-face situation. Making matters worse, the adolescent
brain, because it is in the midst of development, is not
good at assessing risk. And that means kids are easy prey.
After MySpace made that big number public, many called for
better monitoring of such social networking sites. That's
a start. But the only real solution to the scourge of online
predators is MediaWise parents. Check out our Web site at
Mediawise.org to stay current with the promise and peril
new technology brings. Keep tabs on the sites your kids
are using and what they're doing on them. Visit the sites
yourself so you know how they work. You may want to use
special software that lets you know where your kids go on
the Internet, but that's no substitute for the most important
solution of all: talking to your kids. Let them know that
bad people may try to be their friends. Ask them who their
friends are. Above all, make sure they know it's never safe
to meet, unchaperoned, someone they met on the Internet.
David Walsh, Ph.D. is the founder of the MediaWise Movement,
a program of the National Institute on Media and the Family
(www.mediawise.org).
His latest book, No: Why Kids - of All Ages - Need to Hear
It and Ways Parents Can Say It (Free Press) is available
in bookstores.
