Originally Posted 1/23/07
Well, as I said a few months ago – open the flood gates. Myspace has racked up four more lawsuits against it claiming that Myspace failed to employ reasonable safety measures to protect its underage users. Family’s from Texas, New York, Pennsylvania and South Carolina have filed separate actions all claiming that the underage girls (ages ranging from 14 to 15) were lured to meetings with individuals on myspace and were sexually assaulted. In one case the 15 year old girl was drugged before the adult myspace user assualted her. He has subsequently pled guilty to charges of sexual assault and is currently serving a 10 year sentence in prison.
The first lawsuit filed against Myspace concerning their alleged lack of safety measures was filed in Texas in June of 2006. That case is still pending.
While myspace has rolled out or are planning to roll out security features that will give parents some additional oversight and safety measures (like seeing what age is reported in the child’s profile, and restrictions on how adults may contact minor’s on Myspace), many people like the ones filing the lawsuits claim that it is too little to late.
Legally, we’ll have to see how it plays out. In general, courts have taken a laissez fair attitude to the web, however as more and more cases involving minor’s come up, one could imagine that an argument based on public policy reasons may start to sound appealing to some courts.
