FOX News is gonna RUIN SL with this video!

Where else can a 14 year old get in for free and see animated giant penises and orgies so readily and play mindgames with adullts in 3D? They are welcomed.

Leave it OPEN they will come.

Hmm, resorting to taking things out of context?

But to answer your question anyway: google , MSN, Yahoo, IRC, Bittorrent, and internet explorer

Its the store fault for leaving it unlocked and unattended and the dangerous stuff out in the open. That is why companies pay liability insurance since they can't win a case like this. It's called negligence.

And why was the kid running around near a hardware store without supervision?

Yes leaving a door unlocked is foolish, better way of putting it would be: the kid had a credit card and jimmied the lock to get in.

SL is not the internet. Its a virtual world full of animated 3D avatars operated by humans. SL is rated XXX. Five minutes with the search and a kid can go participate in all manner of adult weirdness for free and even have relationships.

A business owning a game like that, needs to take heavy precautions, not use verification that anyone can get around---unless they want everyone coming down on them. Lame denials, claiming they meet the minimum requirements the Law requires, will mean nothing with the inevitable, major scandel hitting the media.

At the same time, society has plenty to worry about with kids and Google and the internet as well and expect all that to change to, since public outcry is just going to get louder. Either learn how to verify properly or remove all the porn.

I would probably be game, oddly enough. But only if they could absolutely guarantee that they could actually keep the kiddies out, which they can't. No matter what, when someone wants something bad enough, they will DO it no matter what.

Now, can we please stop feeding the troll?

Can you access SL without the internet? No

Do parents need to take steps to watch what their kids do on the internet? Yes

Want to know why? Because there are companies based in other countries that are not bound by the rules that affect adult industries in the US

As for the scandals hitting the media... It is more likely that adults would lie and get onto the G-rated teen grid to stalk prey if that is what they are after due to the fact it's got more targets. As for fallout, none of the chat clients require age verification, yet there are constant reports in the news about kids being victimized in chat rooms.

You can't remove the porn from the internet any more than you can remove sensationalism from the news media. It's a never ending flow out there, best you can do is take what steps you can to protect the children in your homes.

After all, in the old days it was just Jimmy sharing his playboys with the younger kids for some of their lunch money... now he's sending them links in yahoo or telling them how to install file sharing software on the computer to download live action porn. (which if a parent set up the kid's accounts right is impossible to install... but then so would getting on the internet without parental supervision)

Whether Fox news is wrong or right, the fact remains kids are able to access SL, so age verification is needed to protect our kids. I love SL, but that doesn't mean predatory behavior should be tolerated, just because an area is rated Mature.
Age Verification will be difficult to achieve, but necessary. Would rather have to prove who I am than have a child abused, or lose access because someone was abused.

There lies a big problem, many countries including all european countries don't give out the information to an american private companie that is needed to verify that I am who I say I am, therefor all atempts at ageverification will fail. They will either be to weak and let kids fake id or to strong and not alow europeans and many others verify.

On the SL main grid, it's the kids that are the predators.

An adult who engages in adult interactions with another avatar who turns out to be a kid is not a predator. That adult is a victim of the kid.

Put yourself in the shoes of an adult predator. You want to finds kids to groom/abuse/whatever.
Where do you go to find kids?
Do you go to:
a) A place where you know there will be kids, and naturally where the kids will be readily identifiable.
or
b) A place where every body is supposed to be adult according to the TOS, and where everyone appears to be an adult.

Duh! No-brainer!
You go to somewhere you can find kids.


Why on earth would an adult predator operate in SL Main Grid?
Where are the RL kids? How do you identify them?

There are kid avatars, but any you happen to stumble across are
1) Specifically stating by their presence that they are actually adults in RL
2) almost certain to AR you for trying to initiate sexual age-play.
If you go searching for "kids" in SL, you are almost certain to find adults.

The last place an adult predator looking for kids would go would be the SL Main Grid.

Can anyone suggest how a predator would go about finding minors on the SL main grid.
(Yeah - sand boxes, griefers, etc , ha ha....) How exactly?
If it's easy to find them, how come LL can't find them? How come concerned residents can't find them to AR them?



Age verification of a standard that would actually keep kids out of adult areas of the Net is not just "difficult". It's impossible without major new initiatives by *all* governments world-wide. It would also require secure new hardware for biometric testing on end-user PCs.
It has been well illustrated that IDV is a farce. It's a fig leaf. it doesn't verify anything. It doesn't protect kids.

Thank you Sling. Sometimes I was able to think along the same lines but was unable to express the thoughts so thank you once again.

This has always been my view. If they were talking about adults accessing the teen grid, then I'd see the predator angle.

Furries? oh really

Nice bit of writing! Its nice to see after some outlandish silly examples.......

Okay this is my 2 cents worth but will probly turn into 20 cents worth before Im done. LOL. First of all this is SECOND LIFE not REAL LIFE. RL has no place here and ppl trying to force their RL issues onto SL should not be here. I am here because RL sucks and it is an escape from it. Lets keep it that way!
Although it is possible for a minor to get on it is highly unlikely they stay. Lets get real ppl this is an adult oriented game. And by adult I mean age nore than content. This game is geared towards baby boomers and would hold little to no interest to a minor. What child wants to hang out with their parents or in a 80's club? Look at the skate parks, something children love and most adults wouldnt go near. They are empty as are the amusement parks etc.
I dont go around asking for real ages because Im not interested so I dont know how many ppl 'claim' to be a minor. I believe most ppl here that claim to be a minor would just be your typical internet liar.
My final point. As far as age play/role play goes arent we all doing that? Everyone on here is young and beautiful. Is the 60 yo Rl age man who engages with a 19 yo RL woman not age/role playing? And if that same couple wanted to play an adult and minor role in RL would it be a crime? My opinion will always be that this is all asdults living out there dream which is what SL is supposed to be. And the s in SL might as well be sex. Unfortunately, nothing sells better than sex here. So deal with it and haters be gone! I will fight to the death for child avis who are the only ones who havent forgotten what fun is about.

Everything you say makes sense. Although I've had at least one semi naked person with a ball gag suddenly rez next to me when I was at a pg place so I don't think there is any perfect solution to the problem.

QFT

I'm a parent, a step-parent, a grandmother and a former child.
My parents were exceptionally attentive and protective but I occasionally found ways to get away with things I was pretty sure they wouldn't like.

Three of my four kids really were exceptionally bright and responsible but at least two of them tried things behind our backs that none of their parental units would have allowed. The fourth was terrifyingly blind to danger and gave us all gray hair. Mercifully they all grew up to be solid citizens. As others have said here I think we did the right thing by focusing more on preparing them for life than protecting them from it and promoting honesty as the most important family value.

It would be great if all children were protected from different life situations and images until they were properly prepared to deal with them. (And I think exposing young children to graphic violence is worse than exposing them to sexual content.)

But in the real world parents must use a lot of time and energy earning a living and keeping the household running. They have needs, desires and fears of their own and other relationships to deal with on top of their parenting duties.

Even parents who aren't working two jobs or whatever can't be looking over their kids' shoulders 24 hours a day and it wouldn't be good for the kids if they did. And let's face it some people who have kids are never going to be very good parents no matter how many times we tell each other what they should be doing.

To some extent we must all be responsible for all the children in our community. I think programs at school to educate children about the dangers of modern living are a good idea. Such programs could be much more helpful than lame "Just say no!" crusades.

As for what legislators or Linden Labs can and should do to protect kids it doesn't seem as if anyone has thought of any new ideas that would really be be all that effective. And personally I'm much more concerned about kids being exposed to disturbing real life images at porn sites than anything they are likely to see in SL.

Kids are going to get in trouble and do stupid things. So responsible adults take steps to lock doors and access to technology when they can't be there (If the kid can't be supervised then password lock the computers; libraries and schools use filtering software and have people there watching over them [some offer unfiltered computers if you are an adult])

And short of forcing world wide adoption of implanted chips for identification, and mandating use of readers in all keyboard & mice there is no way to totally prevent underage children from accessing adult content online. So companies have to balance reasonably invasive verification systems that don't lose a good chunk of the user base they have/want.

It's like car makers and built in breathalysers... they could refit and produce all cars with them... but the general public would scream at the aggravation of breathing into a tube every time they wanted to drive somewhere.

Too many times I've seen things proposed 'for the children' that in effect wouldn't do a whole lot of good to protect them.

Teaching the kids self responsibility and education of the risks (for both parents and kids) of dangers (real world and online) are the best bet for keeping them safe in my mind.

A kid educated about the dangers while on the teen grid can report someone that starts to pry too deep into their rl or ask for more adult interaction. Just like said kid on the chat software can get their parents when it happens if they understand the dangers out there.


Edit:
Companies put ratings on games and movies, most stores have a flag that comes up to check age. Kids get them by asking mommy and daddy for them, parents are busy shopping and don't think about anything other than getting them to hush. So they complain about the companies making the product and stores selling them...

I've seen store personnel being chewed out for making kids sit up at the service desk because they opened items while the parents let them run free... and because now said parent is having to pay for the toy they were running around with.

Most here are at least trying, but there are far too many out there that don't even try...

Tell that to the congressman who is going to be investigating SL. Quick, hide your poseballs and Sex bed and don't forget to age-verify your gerbils.

a joke. Some of my best friends are furries.

Said congressman is using the 'for the kids' rallying cry to garner votes.

And it's the same thing that cost quite a few states a lot of money when they tried to pass laws limiting adult content in games (Just look at Jack Thompson's track records with laws to see most of the examples)

For the kids = got to pass this law even if it will be costing money in the long run when it's contested and overturned for obvious legal reasons... or vote for the bill even when there are things hidden in the fine print that are not int he voter's best interests because others will point out your didn't want to protect the kids

Congressman? Give me strength.

You bang on about how corrupt SL and its users are, yet you will merrily put your faith in some swivel-eyed elected politician to wade in and right the perceived wrongs? Like he gives a toss. He just wants to keep his nose in the trough for another term, so he'll pick a topic he knows jack about to angle for some votes from barking mad fanatics like you.

Ugh ...Ok...look MortVent...now I now you are not the most experienced person in the world, but srsly, its' PARENTS that are screaming to the congress to do something. It takes about 5 minutes to blow the whistle on SL. A kid can go into SL and in a very short time can be taking screenshots of themselves having sex with a donkey and messanging the image to all their friends.

I think the adult content in SL is part of SL, and I'd hate to see it whisked away by over zealous and heavy handed government officials, but truth be told, Kids CAN get into it easy and FOR FREE and this needs to stop, unless you want SL to be dragged through the most terrible kind of mud that makes society think ALL SL people are crazy and sick predators waiting around the prim trees.

Maybe someone will get a bright idea as to how to solve the problem, but one thing for sure is, putting it on parents as the sole responsiblity here, means parents calling their elected officials and telling them what their kids tell them about SL and what they know of themselves.

Keep in mind that without Washington, nothing gets done in terms of network stuff on a large scale and cleaning up the internet and making sure online games aren't full of porn that kids can see----and in SL "porn" is no longer just photos or videos and mere chats----it's interactive, squirting, messy, masturbatory, anonymous, violent, obsessive, spamming, stalking, and a peep show to boot......IT WILL TAKE AN ACT OF CONGRESS....to get these tech companies to fix it and still please the majority of people who do not want their privacy invaded in the process. It will take actual ingenuity and the force of laws to get it to happen.

SL has a big sign on it's figurative, forehead saying:

"Step right up, all you freaks, this is your brave new world. Live your fantasies. And even make money scamming naive people. Even kids can log in for free"

Ah,... hello? Anyone not able to foresee how that will turn out on the Local News?

You want the parents involved. so do I, but real parental involvement means getting congress to do something about Porn sites and Porn Games, that make it easy for kids to get in and people making money off porn (LL included, Server companies included, GOOGLE included....etc.) $$$business people$$$ who are trying to deny responsibility for all this are full of you know what.

Is there a world government? NO

Till there is one world government, there is no way to 'clean up' the internet and the services on it. Especially consider that social morals on sex and nudity is different in various parts of the world (And most systems that i've seen offered would result in losing international customers because they could not verify cutting the profit margins down to the point LL could close said service... hence them taking reasonable and responsible measures)

Companies will take measures to limit access as best they can with current technology.

Yes there are free accounts to get into second life, yahoo messenger, most irc chat rooms, and Google doesn't require an account to use search.

It takes less than 1 second to consider asking a kid "what were you doing on second life's adult grid in the first place instead of the teen grid you should be on?"


If nothing else, LL can simply shut down the grid for a couple weeks and set it up in another country and ban US users to ignore the laws... like many online gambling companies have done due to attempts to legislate morality onto the internet.

This is ironic. Fox owns MySpace. Is the pot calling the kettle black?

Ugh again....c'mon. Let's bring in the whole Orwellian Nightmare again and start talking about "states right" or "colonial rule," socialism the Magna Carta, and anarchy in the streets.