Updating the Social Network: How Outdated and Unclear State Legislation Violates Sex Offenders’ First Amendment Rights

Readily available on computers, phones, tablets, or television, social media has become a necessary platform of expression for many. But, for others, social media is an inaccessible tool whose very use has criminal repercussions. To protect innocent children, many states have enacted legislation restricting sex offenders’ access to social media. Unfortunately, this legislation is often outdated, overly restrictive, and unconstitutional under the First Amendment. North Carolina has recently attracted national attention, as its statute highlights the potential constitutional issues states face in drafting such legislation. To avoid the constitutional concerns that North Carolina faces, state legislators must draft statutes narrowly and provide ample alternative channels of communication for sex offenders. This Note first analyzes current state legislation restricting sex offenders’ social media usage, focusing specifically on North Carolina’s statute. It then discusses the U.S. Supreme Court case Packingham v. North Carolina, challenging the constitutionality of North Carolina’s statute under the First Amendment. This Note explains how Packingham offers the Supreme Court an opportunity to clarify and instruct states on how to properly draft future legislation. Specifically, the Court must address what constitutes a narrowly tailored statute and what type of alternatives must be available for sex offenders whose social media access is restricted. This Note ultimately concludes that North Carolina’s statute is not narrowly tailored and does not leave ample alternative channels of communication. To help avoid these issues in the future, this Note concludes by suggesting a model statute for constitutionally restricting sex offenders’ social media use

Updating the Social Network: How Outdated and Unclear State Legislation Violates Sex Offenders’ First Amendment Rights

Readily available on computers, phones, tablets, or television, social media has become a necessary platform of expression for many. But, for others, social media is an inaccessible tool whose very use has criminal repercussions. To protect innocent children, many states have enacted legislation restricting sex offenders’ access to social media. Unfortunately, this legislation is often outdated, overly restrictive, and unconstitutional under the First Amendment. North Carolina has recently attracted national attention, as its statute highlights the potential constitutional issues states face in drafting such legislation. To avoid the constitutional concerns that North Carolina faces, state legislators must draft statutes narrowly and provide ample alternative channels of communication for sex offenders. This Note first analyzes current state legislation restricting sex offenders’ social media usage, focusing specifically on North Carolina’s statute. It then discusses the U.S. Supreme Court case Packingham v. North Carolina, challenging the constitutionality of North Carolina’s statute under the First Amendment. This Note explains how Packingham offers the Supreme Court an opportunity to clarify and instruct states on how to properly draft future legislation. Specifically, the Court must address what constitutes a narrowly tailored statute and what type of alternatives must be available for sex offenders whose social media access is restricted. This Note ultimately concludes that North Carolina’s statute is not narrowly tailored and does not leave ample alternative channels of communication. To help avoid these issues in the future, this Note concludes by suggesting a model statute for constitutionally restricting sex offenders’ social media use

ePortfolios: Mediating the minefield of inherent risks and tensions

The ePortfolio Project at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) exemplifies an innovative and flexible harnessing of current portfolio thinking and design that has achieved substantial buy-in across the institution with over 23000 active portfolios. Robust infrastructure support, curriculum integration and training have facilitated widespread take-up, while QUT’s early adoption of ePortfolio technology has enabled the concomitant development of a strong policy and systems approach to deal explicitly with legal and design responsibilities. In the light of that experience, this paper will highlight the risks and tensions inherent in ePortfolio policy, design and implementation. In many ways, both the strengths and weaknesses of ePortfolios lie in their ability to be accessed by a wider, less secure audience – either internally (e.g. other students and staff) or externally (e.g. potential employees and referees). How do we balance the obvious requirement to safeguard students from the potential for institutionally-facilitated cyber-harm and privacy breaches, with this generation’s instinctive personal and professional desires for reflections, private details, information and intellectual property to be available freely and with minimal restriction? How can we promote collaboration and freeform expression in the blog and wiki world but also manage the institutional risk that unauthorised use of student information and work so palpably carries with it? For ePortfolios to flourish and to develop and for students to remain engaged in current reflective processes, holistic guidelines and sensible boundaries are required to help safeguard personal details and journaling without overly restricting students’ emotional, collaborative and creative engagement with the ePortfolio experience. This paper will discuss such issues and suggest possible ways forward

Data protection: the challenges facing social networking

The popularity of social networking sites has increased dramatically over the past decade. A recent report indicated that thirty-eight percent of online users have a social networking profile. Many of these social networking site users (SNS users) post or provide personal information over the internet every day. According to the latest OfCom study, the average adult SNS user has profiles on 1.6 sites and most check their profiles at least once every other day. However, the recent rise in social networking activity has opened the door to the misuse and abuse of personal information through identity theft, cyber stalking, and undesirable screenings by prospective employers. Behavioral advertising programs have also misused personal information available on social networking sites. Society is now facing an important question: what level of privacy should be expected and required within the social networking environment

Gay men, Gaydar and the commodification of difference

Purpose To investigate ICT mediated inclusion and exclusion in terms of sexuality through a study of a commercial social networking website for gay men Design/methodology/approach The paper uses an approach based on technological inscription and the commodification of difference to study Gaydar, a commercial social networking site. Findings Through the activities, events and interactions offered by Gaydar, we identify a series of contrasting identity constructions and market segmentations which are constructed through the cyclic commodification of difference. These are fuelled by a particular series of meanings attached to gay male sexualities which serve to keep gay men positioned as a niche market. Research limitations/implications The research centres on the study of one, albeit widely used, website with a very specific set of purposes. The study offers a model for future research on sexuality and ICTs. Originality/value This study places sexuality centre stage in an ICT mediated environment and provides insights into the contemporary phenomenon of social networking. As a sexualized object, Gaydar presents a semiosis of politicized messages that question heteronormativity while simultaneously contributing to the definition of an increasingly globalized, commercialized and monolithic form of gay male sexuality defined against ICT

Virtual Clinical Trials: One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

Virtual clinical trials have entered the medical research landscape. Today’s clinical trials recruit subjects online, obtain informed consent online, send treatments such as medications or devices to the subjects’ homes, and require subjects to record their responses online. Virtual clinical trials could be a way to democratize clinical research and circumvent geographical limitations by allowing access to clinical research for people who live far from traditional medical research centers. But virtual clinical trials also depart dramatically from traditional medical research studies in ways that can harm individuals and the public at large. This article addresses the issues presented by virtual clinical trials with regard to: (1) recruitment methods; (2) informed consent; (3) confidentiality; (4) potential risks to the subjects; and (5) the safety and efficacy of treatments that are approved

Response to Privacy as a Public Good

In the spirit of moving forward the theoretical and empirical scholarship on privacy as a public good, this response addresses four issues raised by Professors Fairfield and Engel’s article: first, their depiction of individuals in groups; second, suggestions for clarifying the concept of group; third, an explanation of why the platforms on which groups exist and interact needs more analysis; and finally, the question of what kind of government intervention might be necessary to protect privacy as a public good

Myspace, Yourspace, But Not Theirspace: The Constitutionality of Banning Sex Offenders From Social Networking Sites

In recent years there has been intense public pressure to enact increasingly restrictive and intrusive sex offender laws. The regulation of sex offenders has now moved online, where a growing amount of protected expression and activity occurs. The latest trend in sex offender policy has been the passage of state laws prohibiting sex offenders from visiting social networking sites, such as Myspace or Facebook. The use of these websites implicates the First Amendment right of expressive association. Broad social-networking-site bans threaten the First Amendment expressive association rights of sex offenders, who do not lose all of their constitutional rights by virtue of their conviction. Although social-networking-site bans are politically attractive on the surface, such prohibitions are fundamentally flawed because they are predicated on a number of widespread misconceptions about sex offenses and sex offender behavior. These misconceptions include the beliefs that all registered sex offenders are violent sexual predators who have extremely high recidivism rates and that Internet predators are increasing the incidence of sex crimes against minors. In fact, there is very little evidence to indicate that this type of legislation will help reduce sexual violence. This Note argues for empirically based and narrowly tailored sex offender policies that will strike the appropriate balance between protecting minors from sexual abuse and respecting sex offenders\u27 constitutional rights. Such an approach is more likely to help rehabilitate offenders and thus protect children and others from sexual predators

Myspace, Yourspace, But Not Theirspace: The Constitutionality of Banning Sex Offenders From Social Networking Sites

In recent years there has been intense public pressure to enact increasingly restrictive and intrusive sex offender laws. The regulation of sex offenders has now moved online, where a growing amount of protected expression and activity occurs. The latest trend in sex offender policy has been the passage of state laws prohibiting sex offenders from visiting social networking sites, such as Myspace or Facebook. The use of these websites implicates the First Amendment right of expressive association. Broad social-networking-site bans threaten the First Amendment expressive association rights of sex offenders, who do not lose all of their constitutional rights by virtue of their conviction. Although social-networking-site bans are politically attractive on the surface, such prohibitions are fundamentally flawed because they are predicated on a number of widespread misconceptions about sex offenses and sex offender behavior. These misconceptions include the beliefs that all registered sex offenders are violent sexual predators who have extremely high recidivism rates and that Internet predators are increasing the incidence of sex crimes against minors. In fact, there is very little evidence to indicate that this type of legislation will help reduce sexual violence. This Note argues for empirically based and narrowly tailored sex offender policies that will strike the appropriate balance between protecting minors from sexual abuse and respecting sex offenders\u27 constitutional rights. Such an approach is more likely to help rehabilitate offenders and thus protect children and others from sexual predators