Pennsylvania Attorney General Corbett Serves Notice on MySpace to Preserve Evidence of Online Profiles Used by Registered Sex Offenders; Calls on Company to Take Further Steps to Protect Children
Pennsylvania Attorney General Corbett Serves Notice on MySpace to Preserve Evidence of Online Profiles Used by Registered Sex Of
HARRISBURG, Pa., May 18 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Attorney General Tom Corbett today sent a formal "preservation letter" to MySpace officials, requiring the company to secure and maintain all information concerning MySpace profiles used by registered sex offenders from Pennsylvania.
"It is essential that MySpace preserve any information about online profiles created by registered sex offenders," Corbett said. "We know that online predators are actively using social networking sites like MySpace to identify potential victims, and it is vital that this information be preserved for possible review by law enforcement."
On Monday, attorneys general from Pennsylvania and seven other states sent a letter to MySpace requesting that the company provide law enforcement with information about registered sex offenders with online profiles.
Published statements attributed to company officials this week indicated that MySpace had "identified, removed and blocked 'a few thousand' user profiles of convicted sex offenders." The preservation letter issued today by the Office of Attorney General requires MySpace to preserve information about the predator profiles it has identified and removed.
"Simply blocking or removing sex offenders' pages on MySpace without making any effort to forward that information to law enforcement or warn other users does little to enhance public safety," Corbett said. "We expect MySpace to preserve and maintain any information about sexual predators until this matter is resolved."
Corbett said this week's public call for action was prompted by credible information received by the attorneys general that indicated that MySpace had internally identified thousands of registered sex offenders with profiles on its popular social networking site. The letter followed more than a year of discussions between the attorneys general and MySpace concerning the presence of sexual predators on the site.
Additionally, Corbett renewed a call for MySpace to institute a system for age verification, to prevent young children from gaining access to adult content on the social networking site.
Corbett said that MySpace accounts are supposed to be available only to individuals 14 or over, but MySpace currently makes no effort to verify the age of its account holders.
Attorneys General from Pennsylvania and other states have been discussing age verification with MySpace officials for more than a year, but company officials have remained steadfast in their opposition to any sort of verification system.
"Our searches have found children as young as 10-years-old with MySpace pages, often displaying pictures and revealing personal information," Corbett said. "We know that predators are actively searching for new victims on sites such as MySpace, but the company is refusing to take reasonable steps to protect children."
Corbett noted that the Attorney General's Child Predator Unit has made two recent arrests in Pennsylvania involving suspected online predators using MySpace.
In the most recent case, Corbett said that a suspected predator arrested on May 17, 2007, indicated that he had used MySpace in an attempt to verify that the undercover agent he was communicating with was actually a child.
Additionally, Corbett said that in October 2006 agents arrested a Pittsburgh man who allegedly used MySpace to sexually proposition a 14-year- old girl while the suspect was free on bail following an earlier sex-sting arrest.
To date, the Attorney General's Child Predator Unit has identified and apprehended 73 suspected Internet predators in Pennsylvania.
Corbett urged MySpace to join with attorneys general and law enforcement from across the country in their efforts to identify and apprehend sexual predators who are using the Internet to communicate with children.
Editors' Note: A copy of the Attorney General's preservation letter to MySpace is available by contacting the Attorney General's Press Office at 717-787-5211.
CONTACT: Nils Hagen-Frederiksen, Deputy Press Secretary for Pennsylvania Attorney General Corbett, +1-717-787-5211, cell: +1-717-319-2252, nhf@attorneygeneral.gov
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