Cyber Sex Crimes and the Law - Research Paper Example

RUNNING HEAD: Cyber Sex Crimes Cyber Sex Crimes and the Law BY YOU YOUR ACADEMIC ORGANIZATION HERE YOUR HERE HERE Incidents of cyber sex crimes, those which occur in the virtual, Internet environment, are on the rise. These sex crimes include child pornography, youth exploitation and the generic online predator looking for sexual victims of all ages. This paper identifies the different steps being taken to combat cyber sex crimes and provides several legal cases in which sexual, criminal behavior was involved in the Internet environment. Cyber Sex Crimes and the Law Introduction Crimes of a sexual nature which occur in the online environment happen every day, taking the form of child pornography, youth exploitation, and the generic online predator looking for sexual victims of all ages and demographics. Complicated, modern societies and the invention of mass-communication tools, such as the mobile device and Internet technologies, are allowing cyber predators to invade a broader realm of the social population. A variety of different social and networking websites also provide ample opportunities for sexual predators to post and download video content in which children are being exploited. In some instances, even videos of various adults in unwanted sexual situations are posted, leading to a whole new type of cyber sex crime in which humiliating others sexually is posted online as a means to bolster social enjoyment and group belonging. Whenever an individual is exposed to unwanted or unsolicited sexual scenarios in the online environment, they have been victimized by a sexual crime. However, where should the line be drawn between simply unethical or questionably-immoral behavior and behavior which is sexually-criminal in nature? This appears to be a widespread debate in contemporary society. This paper identifies the various types of sex crimes occurring in the online environment today as well as steps to prevent these occurrences in the future. In addition, several court cases involving cyber sex crimes are discussed. Overview of Cyber Sex Crimes Nordland and Bartholet (2001) offer startling statistics regarding the prevalence of cyber sex crimes across the globe. For example, a single child pornography ring known as the Wonderland Internet ring took police efforts in 13 countries to end its illegal selling of child sexual videos. The efforts located nearly 750,000 images of child pornography in Britain alone (Nordland and Bartholet). Such international efforts only to break up a single ring tends to reinforce the large volume of child pornography in the online environment today, creating a widespread social problem. Why is this occurring? It is impossible to say with complete accuracy, however the existence of online social networking sites is likely a contributor. Sheppard (2007) identifies the existence of one specific site called the Second Life Virtual World, which currently has 6.2 million registered users. This site allows for anonymous creation of various avatars (cyber characters) which interact with others avatars and create virtual 3D characters of themselves (Sheppard). This anonymity and social exposure allowed one adult user to pose easily as a young child and offer explicit photographs of children through this Second Life online software. In this situation, child pornography is given ammunition to continue simply by websites which cannot verify age or secure the content of what is being posted and transferred over the web. In the situation where 750,000 pictures were located in Britain, such access to social anonymity likely contributed to the distribution of the photos. MySpace, another very popular video-exchanging and social network website, provides ample opportunities for sex crimes to occur. Oser (2006) says that MySpace is the fifth largest social networking site of its kind in the world. With such a large subscriber base, can the owner of the website actually maintain control of the specific content of what is uploaded when millions of videos are being exchanged on a daily basis? In this situation, simply the existence of online communications and exchanging software leads to increases in the occurrence of sexual crimes in the Internet environment. Without these sites, distributing sexually explicit content of children, as one example, would likely not be as socially-prevalent. Between 2000 and 2001, there were approximately 2,500 arrests made by federal, state and local authorities regarding cyber sex crimes involving minors (Piazza, 2004). All of these national arrests have been categorized into three specific groups. The first is entitled Internet crimes against identified victims (ICIV) which amounted to 39 percent of all total arrests (Piazza). The second category was the actual manufacture of child pornography and the third classification involving sex offenders knowingly luring youths in the pursuit of committing sex crimes after setting up a meeting with the youth. Officers make the arrest in this scenario at the meeting point instead of the predator finding the child waiting there. The networking capabilities at libraries, also, even allow sexual predators who would not normally have access to the online environment to commit cyber sex crimes. For instance, in San Jose, California there were 12 arrests for cyber-related sex crimes during the use of library computers (Oder, 2008). Though Jane Light, the director of the San Jose Public Library, believed this to be a minor issue as she was comparing data from 2.1 million different user log-ins for the year 2006-2007. However, if public areas now have access to public Internet, those desiring to commit sexual crimes now have access to equipment without the necessary filters (in some instances) to block the online violation. This is only to illustrate the many opportunities available to sex crime predators to distribute or promote online, criminal sexual behaviors. Sex crimes against non-consenting adults is also a form of cyber sex crime. If an adult individual is forced into having sexual relations with another, this is rape. When the video is distributed to the online environment, it becomes an issue of cyber sex crimes. In some situations, relationships which have gone sour might result in the upload of such sexual material against the adult’s will. In this situation, the victim’s rights have not only been violated but they have become the victims of a cyber sex crime. Even non-social websites can promote the ongoing presence of cyber sex crimes. eBay, for example, has removed actual auctions in which people attempt to put their children up for bid to be involved in sex acts. In the short-term, this is sexual exploitation of the child and eBay regularly monitors auction content for illegal activity and ensures it is swiftly removed. However, this might point toward a social attitude in which people are willing to let their children be exposed any kind of unknown sexual perpetrator for the sake of getting paid. Though eBay would not be at fault for the parent’s behaviors and actions, as the mother actually committed the cyber sex crime, it does point to the importance of having strong regulatory controls at high-profile websites to avoid child exploitation and auctioning children for child sexual slavery. Actions Against Cyber Sex Criminals Morally- and ethically-sound individuals in society, from the regular community citizen to the law enforcement agency and judicial system, are constantly looking for ways to battle the increase in online sexual crimes. For example, in 2007 the Ninth Circuit Court, in United States v. Kelley, upheld a previous ruling against an online sexual predator which allowed for search and seizure of his home based on the content of distributed child pornography e-mails. The judge in the case argued: “The court ruled upon the common receipt of the same email by both the defendant and known child pornography offenders to infer that the defendant knowingly and intentionally possessed the content” (Harvard Law Review, 2008: 1261). In this case, it was not discussed as to how law enforcement agencies had gained receipt of the offenders email, however since it contained explicit, youth sexual material, it was enough to give officers the right for search and seizure of the defendant’s home and computer (Harvard Law Review). This suggests that courts are becoming more conservative in terms of tolerance against the practice of distributing child pornography via email systems. Controlling online child pornography would require email service providers to regulate email content and stop emails which contain child pornography graphics. However, such monitoring would violate the personal rights of the email user under various Constitutional amendments, therefore when judges rule that email can be used as a means to search for evidence through search and seizure it is a big victory in the fight against online cyber sex crimes. MySpace was also involved in a legal case which involved a young girl, Julie Doe, who lied about her actual age on MySpace, posing as an 18-year-old when in actuality she was only thirteen. During her time on MySpace, Doe agreed to a meeting with a 19-year-old she met online, Pete Sous. In this situation, it was alleged that Sous violated Doe sexually and committed sex acts against a minor stemming from the virtual environment (Computer and Internet Lawyer, 2007). In this situation, it was a blow to attempts to block cyber sex crimes from occurring because MySpace was cleared of all liability about protecting the girl due to the fact that the site’s user agreement clearly outlined the site’s inability to verify user ages and expressly warns against providing personal information like home addresses and last names. Even though the girl in this case had committed a type of fraud against Sous, people like Julie Doe can create a wide variety of legal hassles against the innocent for their contribution to complicating the online environment and efforts to halt cyber sex crimes. This particular court case did not give added accountability to MySpace for creating a system whereby user registrations can be assessed to verify ages of minors. Without these types of filters, law-abiding citizens who are genuinely looking for quality relationships with other consenting adults can find themselves in a cyber sex crime against minors legal scenario, battling issues of personal reputation in the process. People who have already committed sex crimes are also being monitored by various governmental agencies to make sure that they do not commit any future sex crimes in the virtual environment. The software operates in the background while the convicted sex offender is surfing the Internet. Keywords and phrases are recognized by the program and will ban websites if they are known to have content which can lead to the motivation to commit cyber sex crimes. When matches are found which can be linked to unacceptable web surfing or access to blocked material, an email is sent to the predator’s probation officer and they are reprimanded accordingly. Even more interesting, all of the convicted predator’s browsing information is stored on the computer’s hard disk in the event that suspected child pornography or other cyber sex crimes are occurring and evidence is needed (Thompson, 2002). All of these software and technological monitoring activities are designed as deterrents for committing future cyber sex crimes and to protect the general public from predatory activities. Cyber sex crimes are certainly not only a problem in the United States, instances are increasing all over the world and various countries have adopted legislation, as well, to stop the processes. For instance, Hong Kong established the Prevention of Child Pornography Ordinance which provides an exact definition of child pornography, restrictions on the issuance of pseudo photographs, and a system of evaluation to determine how best to evaluate both the ordinance and the approach to legal justice (Ong, 2006). This law has likely been established due to the fact that Internet availability is on the rise in Asia due to the development of infrastructures and mobile networks in this developing region. With such a high population density in the far-East areas, such legislation is necessary to define expectations about child pornography and to deter community citizens from engaging in the practice by having clearly-defined consequences for the cyber sex crime. In Britain, organizers against cyber sex crimes created Operation Doorknock as part of the hunt for cyber pedophile criminals. Coupled with the power of a television show which illustrates cyber sex criminals being rounded up and taken to prison, Operation Doorknock was designed to stop over 200,000 incidents of pedophilia in Britain (Boyd, 2002). This also tends to show that some cultures are making a social shift toward stopping cyber sex crimes where community involvement becomes necessary to humiliate those who commit these crimes and ensure that their future actions do not include this behavior. Acting from the philosophy that it takes a village to prevent cyber sex crimes, Britain is surely in the top tier of halting cyber sex crime incidents. Operation Doorknock provided the opportunity to broadcast unedited footage of individuals who were being led away for their cyber sex crimes. It shows the emotional issues involved and the reactions of the predator so that society can see, for themselves, that leadership is taking care of the problem. This also helps to raise community awareness that the problem is so widespread to let others be on the lookout for suspected cyber sex crimes in their own neighborhoods and community regions. Religious leaders, too, are getting involved in the battle to stop cyber sex crimes. Father Fortunato Di Noto, an Italian-American priest, discovered an abundance of child pornography by accident when teaching a Bible class in 1996. A child in the class wanted to search the Internet for the search keyword lollipop. Using an Italian slang for the candy item, the Father typed slurpy. This innocent search returned information about the Pedophile Liberation Front, an organization for people who are attracted to children sexually (Nordland and Bartholet). Disgusted by what he found, Father Di Noto began to assist local authorities in finding information on the Internet regarding child pornography and breaking up various pedophile rings through his dedication to moral living. The religious contribution to stopping cyber sex crimes should not be undervalued as many people in today’s society still look toward clergy leadership when dealing with complicated social and moral issues. The Church works toward displaying divinely-inspired principles of right versus wrong, each of which is clearly outlined in a variety of religious texts in relation to consequences for harming children. As a representative of this belief, the Church as a well-publicized advocate for stopping future incidents of cyber sex crimes is a quality deterrent for online sex offenders and predators to think twice about victimizing children in this fashion. Adding even more deterrent power to the agenda of halting cyber sex crimes, various governmental bodies have created a system in which convicted sex offenders must register when convicted (Thompson). This website has specific street addresses, photographs, full names and a listing of the specific sexual crime which occurred, whether cyber-related or not. This website is publicly listed and anyone in the world can search it to determine whether a pedophile or other sexually-criminal individual is a threat to their neighborhoods. The existence of this website creates a sense of community security and the knowledge that others who might wish to assault them sexually in the online environment are being monitored and regulated. This also provides a sense of shame for the individual being spotlighted in the sex offender registry website, deterring them from receiving even more negative public exposure through illegal cyber sex scenarios. What about the victims? Especially when children are involved, it becomes crucial to understand the potential long-term impact of being the victim of cyber sexual crimes. For example, tactics to engage in sexual behavior include showing children pornographic images and also isolating them from their support networks to build deceptive styles of trust in the adult figure (Physorg.com, 2008). Showing a child pornographic pictures which have been downloaded from the Internet constitutes a cyber sex crime. Additionally, in the virtual world, the sex predator uses Internet chat as a means to isolate the potential victim from their families, providing counseling support or other trust-building exercises to draw them away from others who might argue that it is dangerous to talk with an Internet friend in this manner. If the cyber sex predator becomes a trusted figure and then violates this trust by exposing the youth to unwanted sexual advances, the long-term impact could be severe at the psychological level, leading to issues of trust for others into the future (Morris and Maisto, 2005). Additionally, cases like the one involving Julie Doe reminds society that there should be stricter regulation and monitoring of online websites where information and videos are exchanged daily. Doe was actually the one who committed a crime in the Internet environment by representing herself as an adult when she was actually a minor, leading to an improper legal charge on a consenting adult looking for mutual relationship. Pete Sous was alleged to be the perpetrator of a cyber sex crime simply because of Doe’s deception. In this event, websites should be authorized to remove future access of the fraudulent MySpace (or other sites) users by blocking the unique I.P. address of the computer involved. Though this would not be a solid deterrent, it would remind others in society that false representation about age can lead to long-term consequences against the innocent when issues of cyber sex crimes against minors becomes a legal battle. It is often the actual victim of the cyber sex crime which comes into the forefront of the social consciousness when talking about these issues. However, innocent victims should also be considered when creating the laws necessary to stop future Internet sex crimes. The anonymity provided by the online social environment allows any number of people to misrepresent themselves in the pursuit of identifying victims. For example, consider the following hypothetical scenario: A recently-widowed man at age 40 turns toward a social networking site to find an appropriate relationship to feed his psychological loneliness. During browsing, he comes across a personals listing which describes a similar-aged young woman presenting herself as having similar values. Over a period of weeks, the two discuss life issues and finally make a connection. Upon meeting the two are attracted to one another and they both consent to having a sexual encounter. However, in the process of consensual sex, the man realizes his new Internet relationship is actually a man dressed in women’s attire. This innocent individual has become the victim of a cyber sex crime, being led into a sexual situation in which he was unaware that he was being misled from the very beginning. Though this might sound like an outlandish social situation, it does speak to the volume of different scenarios which could easily occur when there are no verifications or workable monitoring guidelines of social and dating networks. The innocent victim in the hypothetical situation will likely suffer long-term psychological damage and humiliation should this situation ever be publicized in their social network. Should the man dressed as a woman, presenting himself as a woman, be allowed to simply get away with the deception? Does the victim have to go through an embarrassing court proceeding to ensure that others are not victimized in this way in the online social environment? There should be stricter rules to prevent innocent victims from being violated by false online activity and representation. Conclusion The different varieties of cyber sex crimes include child exploitation, child pornography, and any other Internet-related adult exposure to unsolicited sex acts can be deemed a cyber sex crime. Clearly, there are a wide variety of tactics used to lure young children into illegal sexual scenarios and there are widespread, international efforts at the governmental, technological and social levels to combat the problem. Using Internet and site-monitoring tools which recognize keywords or block specific content is one aspect which might serve to stop the activities if the technological systems are efficient. It has been determined that there are also innocent victims in the cyber sex crime scenario dealing with misrepresentation at social and relationship network sites. This is a strain on the legal system in this country (and likely abroad as well) when issues of illegal adult-minor relationships are perceived or occur due to deception about actual youth age on the site. There does not appear to be legislation in place which protects the innocent victim of a cyber sex crime, only the liability of the company which hosted the content, such as My Space. This is clearly an area of improvement in stopping this type of cyber sex crimes. The rising incidents of cyber sex crimes against children is both staggering and appalling and something must be done to stop these activities all across the globe. Understanding basic human rights is the foundation for stopping cyber sex crimes against all demographics by ensuring that no child is ever harmed by Internet sex predators. Whether blocking their content or discussing the issue of the dangers of potential sex predators and their tactics, at least society understands that it is a problem and is taking steps to face it at the community and social levels. However, rising access to receive and distribute child pornography images across the Internet is becoming easier and easier with the invention of email and social networking sites. Without the necessary regulations in place to monitor these activities, other than having officers posing as youths in chat rooms, this is likely to be a long-standing social problem. Clearly, children and all other victims must be protected and they should not have their own Internet privileges reduced due to multiple regulations created which seriously restrict the access to Internet-based knowledge. People have a right to utilize today’s Internet as a means to enhance living and expand personal knowledge. Just because others in the Internet social community believe it is acceptable to commit cyber sex crimes does not mean that legislation is the correct answer to solving this problem. It would appear that it would require a combination of religious and community devotion, governmental legislation, monitoring and accountability to those who fraudulently represent themselves and blame others as the most quality means to ending cyber sex crimes forever. These are not unrealistic expectations and the evidence provided in this project clearly indicate that all of these steps, at some level of administration, are being carried out to protect the innocent web browser. References Boyd, Don. (2002). “The hunt for Britain’s paedophiles”. Guardian.co.uk. Retrieved December 6 2008 from http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2002/may/26/childrensservices.childprotection Computer and Internet Lawyer. 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