“I am pleased that Myspace has agreed to make significant efforts to increase the safety and security of our kids online,” Morrison said. “These steps will better protect Kansas kids from sexual predators using Myspace to lure victims.”
MySpace acknowledged in the agreement the important role of this technology in social networking safety and agreed to find and develop online identity authentication tools. Morrison advocated age and identity verification, calling it vital to protecting children who use social networking sites from online sexual predators and inappropriate material.
Other specific changes and policies that MySpace agreed to develop include: allowing parents to submit their children’s email addresses so MySpace can prevent anyone using those email addresses from setting up profiles, making the default setting “private” for profiles of 16- and 17-year-olds, promising to respond within 72 hours to inappropriate content complaints and committing more staff and/or resources to review and classify photographs and discussion groups.
The agreement culminates nearly two years of discussions between MySpace and attorneys general across the country. The attorneys general were led by North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper and Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, co-chairmen of executive committee consisting of Connecticut, North Carolina, Georgia, Idaho, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and the District of Columbia.
The states pushed MySpace for changes after sexual predators repeatedly used the site to victimize children.
In the agreement, the attorneys general commend MySpace for its efforts to address social networking safety issues.
Under the agreement, MySpace, with support from the attorneys general, will create and lead an Internet Safety Technical Task Force to explore and develop age and identity verification tools for social networking Web sites. MySpace will invite other social networking sites, age and identify verification experts, child protection groups and technology companies to participate in the task force.
The task force will report back to the attorneys general every three months and issue a formal report with findings and recommendations at the end of 2008.
MySpace also will hire a contractor to compile a registry of email addresses provided by parents who want to restrict their child’s access to the site. MySpace will bar anyone using a submitted email address from signing in or creating a profile.
MySpace also agreed to work to implement the following:
- Strengthen software identifying underage users;
- Retain a contractor to better identify and expunge inappropriate images;
- Obtain and constantly update a list of pornographic Web sites and regularly sever any links between them and MySpace;
- Implement changes making it harder for adults to contact children;
- Dedicate meaningful resources to educating children and parents about on-line safety;
- Provide a way to report abuse on every page that contains content, consider adopting a common mechanism to report abuse, and respond quickly to abuse reports;
- Create a closed “high school” section for users under 18.