Proposed IL law: Ban social sites

The proposed law would ban social-networking sites from public schools and libraries in the state of Illinois. The legislation appears similar to the Delete Online Predators Act (DOPA) that was passed by the House last year but died before the Senate could vote, only more sweeping, CNET reports. “For one thing, the House version applied only to those schools and libraries that receive federal funding under the E-Rate program.” But the Illinois law “would apply to social-networking sites on all publicly accessible library computers - apparently without regard for whether the user was a child - and on all computers ‘made available’ to students at public schools.” As for DOPA, it may’ve found new life: “This new version of DOPA, already called DOPA Jr., was introduced by Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK)” last month, a ClickZ News blog reported. Writing about DOPA for CBS News last summer, my BlogSafety.com co-director Larry Magid quipped that “maybe the law should be called DOTA (the Delete Online Teenagers Act)” because, “rather than ‘deleting’ online predators, it [would’ve] deleted the ability of schools and libraries to determine whether kids can constructively take advantage of social networking and other interactive services that are extremely popular among teens.” New legislation under consideration in Washington would do a better job of actually “deleting” predators – by establishing a national sex-offender registry and requiring that offenders register Internet contact information as well as offline info (see 12/8/06).