At St. Martha’s, federal official
discusses perverted justice

By William Kenny
Times Staff Writer

One day after a judge in Philadelphia struck down a federal law aimed at shielding children from Internet pornography, U.S. Attorney Patrick Meehan taught some Northeast Philadelphia kids how to protect themselves from the seedy side of cyberspace.
Meehan, the lead federal prosecutor for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, joined locally based FBI agents at St. Martha’s School to introduce a new phase in the Department of Justice’s ongoing Project Safe Childhood awareness campaign.
Meehan distributed copies of public-service announcements designed to educate teenage girls about the potential dangers of posting and sharing personal information online.
"We have to realize we’re in a whole changed world when we’re dealing in the world of the Internet," Meehan told more than 200 assembled boys and girls in grades six, seven and eight.
The hour-long presentation discussed the common scenario of an adult predator trying to lure a young victim into inappropriate online conversation, a real-life meeting and potential assault.
Researchers have found that one in seven children has received an unwanted sexual solicitation online, while one in 33 has received an "aggressive" solicitation in which the predator seeks some follow-up contact, ranging from personal messages and e-mail to a face-to-face meeting.
The average victim is a 14-year-old girl, Meehan said, while the average predator is a 34-year-old man. Often, predators will lie about their age.
"You can be whoever else you want to be (online), and that creates the opportunity for anybody else to be who they want to be," Meehan said.
Meehan, FBI Assistant Special Agent-In-Charge Ron Hosko and Special Agent Kathleen Kaderabek spoke of the mindset that youths should adopt when on the Internet.
Young people are naturally comfortable and confident online because they’ve grown up with the technology. They often know more than their parents about computers.
"This is something that’s as natural to you as riding a bike was to me," Meehan said, recalling his own youth.
Parents fear that kids understand it better than they do. The kids know they understand it better. And though adults try to filter content, kids find ways to circumvent protections.
Yet, the federal officials explained, many youths fail to observe the same basic rules online that they follow to the letter in the real world.
For example, kids learn early in their lives not to talk to strangers. If an unknown adult offers them candy or a ride in a car, or if he asks for help finding a lost puppy, kids generally know to stay away.
Yet, kids talk to strangers online without having any idea who’s really on the other end of the conversation.
Far and away the most dangerous places on the Internet are "chat rooms," along with social networking sites like MySpace, Kaderabek said.
Predators try to engage potential victims in chat rooms, while they can use information on MySpace to hunt down children they wish to target. All it takes is an ill-advised photo or some personal details about where the child lives or attends school.
That’s why the theme for the public-service announcements is "Think Before You Post," Meehan said. It’s similar to driving a car. There will always be a certain risk involved no matter what you do, but you’re a lot safer when you don’t speed or drink and drive.
"It’s a matter of controlling those risks that will keep you safe," Meehan said.
The federal officials advised that youths should never use a Web cam and shouldn’t post photos of themselves online. They shouldn’t communicate with anyone they don’t know in the real world and should not post any specific identifying information online. It might be OK to say they’re from Philadelphia, for example, but not a specific neighborhood or school.
According to Hosko, undercover police across the nation are using the same kind of online information to capture would-be child predators through what is called the Innocent Images National Initiative.
Law enforcement is focused most on predators because they pose the greatest direct threat to children, although the Internet — for all of its positive attributes — has many other kinds of threats, too.
Graphically violent and pornographic content pervades the World Wide Web. Federal lawmakers in 1998 tried to curb its proliferation to young people by passing the Children’s Online Protection Act.
The act required pornographic Web sites to require adult-access codes, personal identification or credit-card numbers to access the racy content.
On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Lowell A. Reed Jr. ruled that, though the intent of the act was noble, its provisions violated constitutional free speech. The American Civil Liberties Union and other free-speech groups joined Internet industry members as plaintiffs in the case.
Meehan told the St. Martha students that "surfing" questionable sites can cause them problems too, as savvy Web masters can use viruses and spyware to infiltrate their home computers and gather sensitive information.
Most important, even if a youth does something he or she shouldn’t and encounters an inappropriate solicitation, the best recourse is to fess up and report it. Otherwise, a relatively minor mistake could become a major tragedy.
Youngsters can tell their parents or another trusted adult.
Suspicious activity can be reported to the Internet Service Provider (ISP), state and local police, the FBI at 215-418-4000 and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-THE-LOST. ••
The National Center also maintains a Web site at www.cybertipline.com
More information about protecting children from Internet dangers is available at www.netsmartz.org
Reporter William Kenny can be reached at 215-354-3031 or bkenny@phillynews.com