Last week, Lori Drew was cleared of three felony charges in her Megan Meier cyber-bullying trial. These charges related to "accessing protected computers without authorization to obtain information to inflict emotional distress." At the same time, she was convicted on the same misdemeanor charges, while the jury was undecided on a felony criminal conspiracy charge.
Drew created a Myspace.com account under the identity of a "Josh Evans." Through this identity, Drew, along with her daughter and a temporary employee, sought to determine what rumors were being spread about Drew's daughter. This online relationship eventually led to humiliating comments being sent to Meier through the fake Myspace account. Meier, who had been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder and depression, responded to these remarks with the message "you're the kind of boy a girl would kill herself over," shortly before she committed suicide.
This story has been rather popular in the media, and I'd guess it's due to the emotional, tug-at-your-heart aspect of a kind young American girl ending her life over the bullying of an adult through the internet. However, this is also a big deal for internet law. There are currently no federal laws governing cyber-bullying, though there is a growing call for such legislation in Congress, largely due to the Meier case. The decisions made in this trial could easily affect legislation from the local level all the way to the federal level. In law, older rulings tend to set precedents for future cases in the same field. The internet is a delicate subject, and the country is wary on how to legislate and regulate it. Being a child of the internet, this field is incredibly interesting to me, and I hope to some day be involved in shaping this legislative landscape.
This story has been rather popular in the media, and I'd guess it's due to the emotional, tug-at-your-heart aspect of a kind young American girl ending her life over the bullying of an adult through the internet. However, this is also a big deal for internet law. There are currently no federal laws governing cyber-bullying, though there is a growing call for such legislation in Congress, largely due to the Meier case. The decisions made in this trial could easily affect legislation from the local level all the way to the federal level. In law, older rulings tend to set precedents for future cases in the same field. The internet is a delicate subject, and the country is wary on how to legislate and regulate it. Being a child of the internet, this field is incredibly interesting to me, and I hope to some day be involved in shaping this legislative landscape.
2 comments:
From what I understand, the Lori Drew Verdict also means that a opening fake account on a web site is illegal. Apparently, opening an account under a false persona is “unauthorized access” to a social media site. I don't know if I approve of this ruling; anonymity is important to some aspects of the internet...
I think it's deemed "unauthorized" based on the Myspace Terms & Conditions. As far as I can tell, such activity is only illegal on sites that restrict it through their terms of use.
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