Currently only ISPs have a duty to report suspected child
pornography-related activity to the US National Center for Missing
and Exploited Children. McCain's bill, though, extends that duty to
social networking sites, and to all sites that carry message
boards.
McCain's proposed law is mainly aimed at sex offenders, but
contains the demands on social networking sites within it. It says
that site operators who know of any activity relating to child
pornography must "make a report of such facts or circumstances to
the CyberTipline of the National Center for Missing and Exploited
Children."
McCain's proposed law says that it applies to any "social
networking site, chat room, message board, or any other similar
service using the internet."
The proposed law has been read twice by the Senate and must now
be referred to a committee for discussion. It says that convicted
sex offenders in the US will have to register their online
identities with the authorities if new laws being proposed are
passed.
If the bill became law it would create a significant extra
regulatory burden on many sites, since a wide variety and large
number of sites host message boards. The law would likely carry
heavy penalties for site operators who did not notify authorities
when offending material was posted.
Amidst fears that social networking sites have made it easier
for sexual predators to target young people, McCain has also
proposed in his law that sex offenders identify all their online
aliases to authorities.
McCain last week introduced a proposal for his bill, Stop The
Online Exploitation Of Our Children Act, which orders that
convicted sex offenders register all email addresses, instant
messaging names and chat room names so that they could be
identified online. McCain proposed a 10 year jail sentence for
those who fail to do so.
The biggest social networking site MySpace last week said that
it would ban sex offenders from signing up to the site. This would,
though, depend on a system of registration of digital identities
such as that proposed by McCain.
The state of Virginia has also proposed a similar law. Attorney
General Bob McDonnell backs the plan. "We require all sex offenders
to register their physical and mailing addresses in Virginia, but
in the 21st century, it is just as critical that they register any
e-mail addresses or IM screen names," he said.
