Internet Tech
The Internet links people together via computer terminals and telephone
lines
(and in some cases wireless radio connections) in a web of networks and
shared
software. This allows users to communicate with one another wherever
they are in
the "net." This Internet link began as the United States military
project
Agency Network Advanced Research (ARPANET) during the Vietnam War
in 1969. It
was developed by the United States Department of Defense’s (DOD)
research
people in conjunction with various contractors and universities to
investigate
the probability of a communication network that could survive a
nuclear attack.
For the first decade that the Internet was in existence,
it was primarily used
to facilitate electronic mail, support on line
discussion groups, allow access
to distant databases, and support the
transfer of files between government
agencies, companies and universities.
Today over 15 million people in the United
States and approximately 25
million people worldwide access the Internet
regularly, including children.
Many parents believe that depriving their
children of the opportunity to
learn computer skills and access the knowledge
available on the Internet
would give them a distinct technological disadvantage
as they enter the
twenty first century. Portelli and Mead state by the year
2002, the
reported number of children who access the Internet from home is
projected to
increase from the current 10 million to 20 million (6). In addition
to home
access, Poretelli and Meads further stated that as of 1997 the
percentage of
United States schools that offered Internet access as a part of
their regular
curriculum was over sixty percent. There were over nine thousand
public
libraries across America in 1997, sixty percent of these offered
on-line
access to its users (7). In view of this information, one can
concluded that the
on-line percentage for both schools and libraries has
increased notably since
1997 and the number continues to grow as more of
these facilities "plug in and
log on." Whether at home, at school, or at the
public library, children are
accessing the Internet. The word "children" is
somewhat ambiguous
considering the range of ages that it encompasses. For
instance, eighteen is the
normally accepted age at which a child reaches
legal adulthood; therefore,
"children" would refer to any age between
birth and seventeen. Porterfield
stated that a study conducted in 1997 by
Gateway 2000, a leading computer
manufacturer, concluded that most children
Internet access and computer skills
typically commence with their school
work. Although in some cases it may be
earlier and in some later, the typical
age at which a child begins to learn
computer skills are kindergarten age, or
age five. For example at the Children
Television Work Shop website, a
young child can click on a query and in a few
days an E-mail arrives. For the
purpose of this analysis, the broad word"children" will be condensed to contain
two age groups -- elementary level,
ages' 5-12, and secondary level, ages'
13-18. At either level, the World Wide
Web poses clear dangers to
children. These children grow up enlightened with
technology, which they take
for granted and know exactly how to use it. Most
parents are not conscious of
what lies behind that innocuous screen. If you give
one's child carte blanche
use of a computer attached to a modem, it is as
serious as handing a
ten-year-old the car keys and telling them to have a good
time. These
"cyberchildren" are vulnerable to potential dangers as a result
of Internet
use. These perils include contact with dangerous individuals,
exposure to
sexually suggestive materials, exposure to explicit conversations
and
obscenity in chat rooms, and access to violent interactive games. One
very
dangerous downside to Internet communication is its potential for the
telling of
untruths. One can never be certain at any given time to whom one
is talking or
if the conversation is sincere and truthful. Clothier state
that a recent issue
of Yahoo! Internet Live reported that almost half of the
Internet users they had
questioned lied occasionally while on-line and ten
percent were untruthful fifty
percent of the time (2). Asch state that
Gateway Global Research surveyed six
hundred families in the spring of 1998.
This research revealed that seventeen
percent of elementary and middle school
children lied about their age, or sex
while chatting on-line (E1). This
fibbing among peers is not where the danger
lies. The real peril exists in
those other, older individuals who purposefully
lie with the intent to harm.
Parents can no longer assume their children are
safe because they are at home
and the door is locked. Instead of hanging around
the playgrounds looking for
victims, these cyber-preadators are simply logging
on their computers.
Defined as "adults whose sexual fantasies and erotic
imagery focuses on
children as sexual partners," pedophiles have discovered
a haven in
cyberspace. These dangerous individuals often cruise the chat rooms
dominated
by teens and younger children, posing as a child of similar age. Often
these
individuals try to solicit the children’s location and identity, with
the
intent to set-up an on-line meeting. Once the meeting place and time
are
established, the children become easy prey for these twisted
individuals.
Officials of law enforcement have pointed out an alarming
fact concerning
on-line pedophiles. Durkin says that an upward trend in this
practice indicates
the possibility that, due to the Internet, some of these
individuals may now be
acting on fantasies they otherwise might have never
carried out (16). Reports
have shown that these instances are becoming more
numerous and warn that
children should report any suspicious on-line behavior
to parents. The parents
are then urged to inform law enforcement officials.
In view of the rules of
on-line privacy and anonymity, law enforcement
officers have found these
criminals to be hard to detect and locate. There
are millions of web pages
dealing with a wide variety of subject matter
available on the World Wide Web
and more pages are being uploaded daily.
Although only one percent of this
information could be called indecent, there
is still the chance that a child
might run across information that contains
sexually explicit material. Although
regulations have been placed on web
sites that offer sexual content, most of
these sites can still be accessed
without a credit card. For instance, Madden
says a visit on Netscape at the
Yahoo search engine, one could only type in"men" and approximately 3,440 sites
matching would appear. One of these
sites was actually be labeled "sex":
lesbian, gay and bisexual. There would
even be pictures; Images of men." This
site could be easily access by
children. These children are subject to view
butt shots of young boys. They
could even preview several other shots that
are designed to lure them into
giving up a credit card number; however, there
are various shots that could be
access without a credit card. Portelli and
Mead say the Supreme court in 1982
ruled the use of pornography involving
children to be "harmful to the
physiological, emotional, and mental health"
of children and criminalized the
practice, instigating strong enforcement and
severe punishment for offenders
(7). They further stated the Communications
Decency Act of 1996, which strove to
end the flood of pornography available
on the Internet, was ruled to be
unconstitutional by the Supreme Court due to
violation of the First Amendment
(7). In other words, the issue of how to
protect minor from Internet pornography
without violating the right of free
speech is under debate. The tendency of
children to conjugate in on-line chat
rooms is universal. It is hard to regulate
the nature of these chats as it is
to censure live conversations among groups of
children. Groups sharing the
same interests and the same age levels usually
create these chat rooms.
Access to these rooms is usually not coded or barred,
so the presence of a
pedophile or other type of sexually twisted individual is a
real and distinct
possibility. The usual tendency of these individuals is an
attempt to direct
the conversation to a sexual subject, often using explicit and
indecent
language. If found, it is easy for a child to enter a sexually explicit
chat
in progress. Since there is minimal monitoring of chat rooms, these
are
sometimes labeled in a manner that reveals the nature of the conversation
going
on within. For example pornography materials was just a click away
from
"Governor’s kid page" (fun facts, coloring books, etc.). Grooves
state
that once the children access this web site, all they had to do was to
click on"links." By their surprise, an adult chat room appeared with exchanges
of
sexually explicit messages within. The dangers of the Internet continue
with a
variety of interactive video games. These games are usually access
through
dial-up networks and through on-line services. Many of these games
can be
downloaded at no charge. These interactive games include arcade type
games,
classic puzzle games, and role-playing adventure games. Cummins state
a recent
survey of nine hundred students in the fourth through the eight
grade revealed
that nearly half of the children stated that violence and
fantasy was involved
in their favorite video games (1E). Considering this
statement one can conclude
that it is these violent fantasy games, these
role-playing adventure games, that
have recently been the focus attention.
Following the recent tragedy at
Columbine High School in Littleton,
Colorado, FBI agents have been taking a
closer look at the Internet and the
consequences of its role-playing games.
Alderson says the gunmen involved
at Columbine, Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan
Klebold, 17, two Columbine
seniors, were members of a dark on-line community
calling itself the
Trenchcoat Mafia (31A). In other words, this Internet world
evolved from
simple role-playing fantasy games to an on-line world filled with
deep hatred
and violent schemes. Robert Denerstein, staff writer of the Denver
Rocky
Mountain News, reported that the events at Columbine "Underscored
changes
that have already occurred" and "point to the hidden life of many
youngsters"
(31A). A pertinent fact that needs mentioning at this point is
that Harris
and Klebold, Columbine gunmen mentioned above, obtained the
knowledge to
build their pipe bombs from the Internet. This is not the first
time the
negative effect of interactive games and the Internet have been the
center of
tragedy and the subject of scrutiny. In 1997 Michael Carneal, age 14,
brought
a gun to his Paducah, Kentucky high school with the intent to
harm.
Michael began shooting at students involved in a prayer group.
Parents of three
of the victims brought lawsuits against various media
companies on grounds that
their products contributed to the violent episodes.
Among the defendants were
game manufacturers Nintendo and Sony, who produced
games the young gunman was
fond of playing -- violent games such as "Doom"
and "Mortal Kombat."
An Internet pornography site was also among the
defendants. The parents of the
gunman, as well as his teachers, school
officials, and classmate, were also held
partly responsible for the shooting.
Cummins state that David Grossman, a United
States Army retiree who now
teaches psychology at Arkansas State University,
says that some of these
violent video games "are no different than military
simulators...in some
ways, worse" (1E). Considering this statement one can
conclude that what the
children of today are getting from these video games is
military training, a
process of continuous stimulus and response known as"operant conditioning". A
process in which the main objective is to teach to
kill. The violence of
these interactive games available through the Internet
needs to be
scrutinized. The key to sheilding children from negative influences
on the
World Wide Web lies in knowledge. Parents and other influential adults
such
as teachers and librarians need to get to know the Internet, to learn
the
World Wide Web and what it has offer. Douglas Ruhoff observed in a
1996 USA
Weekend article that the children are "native" to the high tech
world of
today where the parents are ‘immigrants"
(12).
Bibliography
Alderson, Andrew. "International: New Threat by
Trenchcoat Mafia." The
Sunday Telegraph . April 1999. 31A Asch, Kim.
"Teens’ Social Lives Woven
Into the Web." The Washington Times. August
1998. E1 Clothier, Mark.
"TechReport: A Little Lying is Part of the
Online Culture." The Atlantic
Journal and Constitution. February 1999. 2
Cummins, H. J. "War Games - Are
Video Games No Different Than Military
Training Simulations? Are We Teaching Our
Children To Kill ?" Minneapolis
Star Tribune. January 1999. 1E Denerstein,
Robert. "Into the Heart of
Darkness - Two Killers Lived in Suburbs, But
Inhabited Their Own Twilight
World." Denver Rocky Mountain News. April 1999.
31A Durkin, Keith F.
"Misuse of the Internet by Pedophiles: Implications for
Law Enforcement
and Probation Practice." Federal Probation. September 1997.
14-18 Groves,
Howard. "Conduct of Life". Christian Science Monitor. 16 March
1999: 24
CD-ROM. UMI- EBSCOhost. April. 1999 Madden, Lisa. "What Dangers
Lurks
Behind that Screen". New Hampshire Business Review. 15 August 1999:
14 CD-ROM.
UMI- EBSCOhost. April. 1999 Sources Cited Portelli,
Christopher J. And Mead,
Coralie W. "Censorship and the Internet - No
Easy Answers." Contemporary
Women’s Issues. October 1998: 4-8 CD-ROM.
UMI- EBSCOhost. April. 1999
Porterfield, Deborah. "Ask Parents Why They
Want a Computer and You’ll
Hear..." Gannett News Service. June 1997.
CD-ROM. UMI- EBSCOhost. April. 1999
Rushkoff, Douglas. "Are ‘Screenagers’
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June 1999. 12