Click to enlarge
Two Senators plan to introduce legislation that could help keep registered sex offenders away from social networking sites such as MySpace.New York Democrat Charles Schumer and Arizona Republican John McCain announced their intentions to introduce a bill at the beginning of the 110th Congress, in January, that would require registered sex offenders to submit their active email addresses to law enforcement agencies, Reuters reports. The legislation would allow MySpace and other sites to check registering users against a database of sex offenders, and deny access to them.
Under the proposed legislation, registered sex offenders would be required to give an email address to their probation or parole officers. Those submitting a fraudulent email address or caught using an unregistered email address would be in violation of probation or parole terms and could face a return to prison.
Earlier this week, MySpace said it had struck a deal with Sentinel Tech Holding Corp., an expert in background verification, to build a database to help identify and block convicted sex offenders from the popular online social network. "This legislation combined with our announcement earlier this week of plans to build the first real-time searchable national sex offender database will make the internet a far safer place for all," MySpace Chief Security Officer Hemanshu Nigam said in a statement.