Social networking sites MUST protect their users

Social networking sites have a moral responsibility to offer some protection to their users because of the type of information they make available to the public. Yes, the primary responsibility to protect children falls on parents. However, this is often a very difficult things to do in today's technically complicated world. Short of not letting their children online at all (which is also tricky to do now), the parents often have few tools to combat the crouching predators.

Well, it seems that at least one of these popular sites is trying to help. My Space is offering a program that is to be installed on computers in the home. It will "collect the username, age and hometown information of any user of the PC who logs onto MySpace and alert the administrator -- assumed to be the parent -- of any changes". I think this is a great thing (though I can see where kids, who are usually smarter than their parents when it comes to such things, will be able to get around it). I applaud My Space for taking these steps, even if it is in the face of a lawsuit (sometimes lessons are learned the hard way).

Obviously one company among many offering this kind of tool is not going to fix everything.  Though it is a step in the right direction, there are still too many of these types of companies not willing to make a move towards security.  Another quote from the article states, "Other online firms will not participate in the program because of privacy concerns".

While I agree that privacy concerns are very valid in today's crime-rampant Internet, the fact is that greed is more often the motivator than any "privacy concern" when it comes to online communities. These types of companies must weigh the cost of implementing security measures, just like other companies. However, if they want to look at what it costs to install good security, they also have to look at what will happen to their sites as public opinion is built up against them. Politicians do nothing if they do not hold their finger in the wind of public opinion. If they see that the public is in an uproar because of lawsuits such as this one, they are going to realize that political hay can be made. Soon, these companies will find themselves regulated out of existence, with some grandstanding politician becoming the hero.

But social networking sites have more than just money to look at as a factor. Economic rewards must be taken into consideration, but like I said in my first sentence, there is moral and ethical responsibilty in play here that these types of sites must come to grips with if they want to be around for the long term. These sites are dangerous. If they still make an economic decision against implementing security measures to help protect the kids, then they deserve what they get.