In the past I’ve been critical of sites like MySpace for allowing 14-year-olds to join, posting personal information for all to see. Well, the New York Times reports the problem is getting worse in some ways:

“Popular Web sites like YouTube and MySpace have hired the equivalent of school hallway monitors to police what visitors to their sites can see and do by cracking down on piracy and depictions of nudity and violence.

“So where do the young thrill-seekers go?

“Increasingly, to new Web sites like Stickam.com, which is building a business by going where others fear to tread: into the realm of unfiltered live broadcasts from Web cameras.

“The site combines elements of more popular sites, but with a twist. In addition to designing their own pages and uploading video clips, its users broadcast live video of themselves and conduct face-to-face video chats with other users, often from their bedrooms and all without monitoring by any of Stickam’s 35 employees.”

It’s easy to get angry at Stickam here, but I think we’re fast approaching the bottom line: Technology is spreading to the degree that children will have access to webcams and personal networking sites. The biggest Web sites can behave responsibly, as MySpace and YouTube increasingly are, but there will always be upstarts with small budgets and little regard for safety.

It falls to parents to handle the problem — though many are not technologically capable enough, and many others simply don’t care. Supervision and good filtering are key here, but I won’t be holding my breath.

One small upside to webcams:

“Mr. Kihioka of Stickam said that in some respects, his site was actually safer than other social networks. Live video feeds let users ‘know who they are talking to,’ he said. ‘Unlike MySpace, it is hard to disguise yourself.’ But he added that his company had the same concerns about child safety as MySpace and was working on an automated system that would monitor live video feeds for indecency.”

But:

“Other companies that offer Web cam chats say that the technology seems to attract abuse. ‘There are just some people who, if you give them a Web cam, are going to take off their clothes,’ said Jason Katz, founder of PalTalk, an eight-year-old service that lets users converse over Web cams on various topics. Unlike Stickam, PalTalk asks for a credit card and charges a monthly fee, which it says prevents minors from signing up.”

Credit card age verification, with an 18-plus restriction on membership? Sounds like a plan.

It’s amazing how much has changed in 10 years. When I was in middle school, a friend’s brother used his mom’s credit card to buy access to pornography. He got in trouble, and it was all quite amusing. Chat rooms were primitive, and we never really used them.

Now, unsupervised Internet meddling can get kids seriously hurt.

Disclosure: I have a MySpace page.

Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.