Police said the teacher, Daniel P. Corvino, 31, sent pictures of himself masturbating, using a web cam to broadcast pictures of himself over the past year. He was charged with aggravated criminal sexual contact and endangering the welfare of a child.
Fortunately, kids told a teacher about it after a lesson on the dangers of the Web sites Facebook and MySpace. Corvino apparently maintained web pages on both sites although it's not clear if he used those sites or simply sent the photos via the Internet. See article at http://www.nj.com/timesoftrenton/stroies/index.ssf?/base/news-4/1203138348233080.xml&coll=5.
I'm from the generation that doesn't quite understand MySpace and Facebook but I guess it's another one of those things I need to learn about. Both are social networking sites that young people use to keep in touch with friends and meet new friends.
MySpace and the atttorneys general from 49 states last month announced an effort to make MySpace more safe for teen-agers by setting the profiles of 16 and 17-year-olds to private so that only established online friends can visit their pages. See the New York Times Blog Bits for more details http://bits.blogs.nutimes.com/2008/01/14/myspace-to-let-parents-block-their-kids-from-joining/.
From what I understand Facebook, which was intended primarily for college students, already has more protections in place since it allows postings from a university. But at large universities, that could be thousands of people so it still doesn't completely protect young people.
The scary thing about these websites is that they can be used by sexual predators. So the important thing is for kids to not reveal too much information about themselves and to keep the information they do post on MySpace private. There are options for both public and private pages on MySpace. The private option means that only invited friends can view your pages. Young people should also know that they can not accept requests from strangers to add them as a friend. There is a feature on MySpace that blocks add requests from strangers by only allowing add requests from people who know your last name.
Generally, young people should know not to post any information about their address, their telephone number or other information that could allow a stranger to track them down.
Parents can also create their own MySpace page so they can keep track of what their child is doing. Many of these tips are available at Suite 101.com: htttp://social-networking-tagging.suite101.com/article.cfm/myspace_safety_tips_for_parents
