MIDLOTHIAN, Va. (AP) — On the screen at the front of the classroom, Gene Fishel, a Virginia assistant attorney general, flashed an online social-networking profile of “hotlilflgirl,” a 15-year-old girl who says she enjoys being around boys and wants to meet new people.
The next image revealed the real “hotlilflgirl” — a mugshot of a 31-year-old man convicted of sexually abusing 11 children whom he met online and sentenced to a 45-year prison term on charges including child pornography and forcible sodomy.
“Not little, not fly and not a girl,” said Mr. Fishel, warning teens about the dangers of sharing personal information on the Internet and agreeing to meet Web acquaintances in person.
Mr. Fishel’s recent presentation at James River High School was one of many being held in classrooms this school year across Virginia, the first state to mandate that public schools offer Internet-safety classes for all grades. It’s one of many measures being taken nationally to protect young Web users.
Virginia’s requirement initially stemmed from concerns about sex offenders preying on children online and a general increase in Internet-based crime, including spamming and phishing. More than half of the world’s Internet traffic flows through Virginia, as America Online and MCI have major operations in Northern Virginia, says Attorney General Robert F. McDonnell, a Republican.
Texas and Illinois are among states that subsequently passed Internet-safety education laws, but unlike Virginia, they don’t make the courses mandatory. Others are considering similar legislation, said Judi Westberg Warren, president of Web Wise Kids, a nonprofit group funded by corporations such as Verizon, Symantec and the federal government to provide schools with no-cost, Internet-safety lessons for 11- to 16-year-olds.
The Illinois law recommends that school divisions adopt online-safety-training curricula and offers guidelines on topics that should be included, said Matt Vanover, spokesman for the State Board of Education.
Miss Warren said such efforts are overdue as the Internet’s technological advances have enabled criminals to reach more victims.
The FBI doesn’t specifically track the number of sexual abuse cases that originate online. But according to a 2006 study by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, about 13 percent of Internet users 10 to 17 received unwanted sexual solicitations. Ninety percent of them targeted teens. Four percent of those youths reported being asked for nude or sexually explicit photographs of themselves.
For preteens, schools often focus on cyber-bullying, which includes harassing, spreading gossip or otherwise targeting others online. Several states have passed measures against cyber-bullying.
Nine percent of youths in the center’s survey reported being harassed online, and 28 percent acknowledged that they “made rude or nasty comments to someone on the Internet.”
Tammy McGraw, director of the Virginia Department of Education’s office of educational technology, has worked with school divisions to integrate Internet safety lessons into course work. The office also helps schools educate parents, including encouraging families to use filtering software and put their computers in public areas of the house. “This is absolutely essential,” she said.
Under mounting pressure, social-networking site MySpace reached an agreement to create a task force to devise ways to protect youngsters from online predators and bullies. The deal is between the company and 49 of 50 states. Texas’ attorney general has said he cannot support the effort because it lacks a way to verify users’ ages.
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