CHICAGO (WBBM) - A case of cyberbullying blamed for the death of a young teen is behind a push to make online harassment a crime.
WBBM’s Debra Dale reports.
The parents of a 13-year-old Missouri girl who committed suicide say she was pushed over the edge by online messages from the mother of one of her former friends posing as a teenage boy on MySpace.com.
A year later, no criminal charges have been filed against the woman who allegedly created the online profile, and it's unclear if any ever will be brought.
U.S. Rep. Melissa Bean (D-Ill.) and state Attorney General Lisa Madigan say it’s time to take action but say any legal reforms must protect freedom of speech rights and say federal reform might be more appropriate since someone from out of state can contact children online.
According to recent studies, 93 percent of children ages 10 and older have access to the Internet, and many are users of social networking sites like MySpace.com and Facebook.com.
Bean is pushing for swift Senate action on a package of recently-passed Internet safety bills.
She sponsored H.R. 3461, SAFER NET, which calls for the creation of a national education campaign on Internet safety. She co-sponsored H.R. 3845, the PROTECT Act that provides resources for law enforcement experts to track down known sex offenders’ Internet footprints online., and H.R. 719, the KIDS Act that requires sex offenders to register their e-mail and instant message addresses with the National Sex Offender Registry, as they now register their physical addresses.
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