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NY Sex Offenders Stymied on 13 Social Networking Sites

by Tim Stevens on December 11, 2009 at 02:15 PM

New York Sex Offenders Banned from 13 More Sites
For the past few years, social network mega-sites Facebook and MySpace have been getting a little safer thanks to each making efforts to block sex offenders. Now, much of the rest of the Internet is getting the similar treatment, with New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announcing that 13 more sites are finally following suit, hooking into the state's database of sex offenders and filtering them out. In a statement, Cuomo said, "It is no secret that sexual predators abuse social networking websites to find and manipulate victims and to insinuate themselves into their victims' lives."

Facebook and MySpace are the biggest of the social networks online, but sex offenders have been officially banned from New York since August. This move by sites like Google's Orkut.com and Aol's Beebo.com to block offenders will make it much harder for them to register, at least in the state of New York, where they must not only register their home address but also any e-mail, instant messenger handles, and other online personas they may be using. Other states have yet to follow suit in opening up sex offender databases, but it's hard to see any politician not getting behind this sort of measure. [From: Office of the Attorney General, via: CNET]

Tags: beebo, facebook, myspace, new york, new york state, NewYork, NewYorkState, ny, orkut, sex offenders, SexOffenders, social networking, SocialNetworking, top

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