We’ve
moved from www.internet-crime-education.org
- sorry for change of URL
Internet Crime Education Organization, Inc.
Founded
July 26, 2000
Last
update: March 6, 2001
A
non-for-profit corporation in compliance with Chapter 617, Florida Statutes.
Principal Office:
2121 Ponce de Leon Boulevard, Suite 430, Coral Gables, FL 33134
Editorial Address:
7333 Miami Lakes Drive, PMB #653, Miami Lakes, FL 33014
This purpose of this site is to educate the public of the
various types of crimes committed on the Internet. The site will continually be under construction and we intend on
updating it on a frequent basis as new types of crimes are discovered on the internet.
We sincerely believe that educating the public about
Internet crimes will serve as a deterrent to future crime and also reduce the
number of crime victims. If we can
prevent one crime from happening to someone then the time and effort will be worth
it.
Contents:
(scroll down for each section)
ADVICE FOR PARENTS
OF CHILDREN
Sales of personal computers have grown tremendously in
recent years and are expected to do so in the future. Most PC’s have Internet access and the average time spent daily
on the Internet continues to increase.
Slightly over 300 million people will access the Internet at least once
per week, from business or home, in 2000 and that number is projected to
increase to 700 million in the year 2005.
An estimated 10.5 million kids are now online and that number is
expected to grow to 45 million kids by 2002.
We strongly feel that all parents become more aware of all the risks
involved in allowing their children to use the Internet. We have seen numerous articles in newspapers
and magazines detailing the desired features that computers should have when
parents buy them for their children but absolutely nothing about the dangers
involved in accessing the Internet.
The Internet undoubtedly offers countless educational
opportunities for children to learn more about the world and gather research
material on virtually any subject.
Unfortunately there are also countless opportunities for your child to
access sexual content in the form of filthy graphics and text, including child
pornography, torture, bestiality, bondage and discipline, group sex,
homosexuality, etc. Worse than that,
the Internet provides a means for pedophiles and deviates to make contact with
your children through numerous chat rooms that are provided by numerous
Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) and chat room hosting sites. Child exploitation is dramatically on the
rise and the victims are at high risk to become perpetrators of child
exploitation later in life.
Perhaps some of you can relate to the following
comparison: when I was a teen in the
60’s, the “adult” magazines were generally only available to adults and sold in
a limited number of stores. The content
of these large distribution magazines was extremely mild compared to today’s
magazines and I distinctly recall that most of the magazines could not show the
female nipple areas or pubic areas. I
didn’t see total nudity in a magazine until I was 18 and in the military
service in Baltimore. As time marched
on, the magazines eventually increased their exposure of the female bodies to
the point of total nudity. Raunchier
magazines came onto the market in the 70’s and today you can find a selection
of adult magazines in convenience stores, book stores, airport newsstands,
etc. I haven’t seen a current adult
magazine in years but I can imagine what is being depicted. The Internet contains images far worse than
what you will find in magazines.
The thought of children viewing pornographic images that I
didn’t see until I was 18 is mind-boggling.
I have never heard of any legitimate study that concludes the viewing of
pornography is healthy for anyone regardless of age, and undoubtedly children
have to be adversely affected by being exposed to it at such an early age. Children become desensitized into thinking
that pornographic activity is “normal.”
Individual attitudes towards the opposite sex are changed and the
important factors of friendship, love, and marriage before sex are discarded in
favor of experimentation with different partners without any commitments. Some individuals become totally addicted to
viewing pornography on the web and give up any social life in order to spend
increasing amounts of time on the Internet.
Young males will view women as only sexual objects to be used for
personal satisfaction and this attitude will continue throughout their lives,
detrimentally affecting them and every woman they come in contact with. Sexual harassment on the job and in normal
encounters will never be eliminated as long as males view their female
counterparts as purely sexual challenges to be conquered.
The Internet contains a huge amount of web sites, free and
subscription that contain pornographic images of virtually every type of sex
act imaginable. While virtually most of
the sites require visitors to certify that they are 18 and over, there is no
way for the web site to verify that the visitor is actually over 18 unless they
have an age verification program that requires a credit card to pay for a
subscription. Even with that in place,
a child could simply enter the required information from a parent’s credit card
and gain access.
In addition to web sites, the Internet contains approximately 30,000 public Usenet newsgroups that anyone can gain access to. While most newsgroups are legitimately dedicated to a particular topic, such as specific types of automobiles, cellular telephones, military, airports, commercial aviation, etc., there are a large number of newsgroups dedicated to erotic and pornographic images. Some newsgroups contain images of child abuse pornography. While certain Internet Service Providers, such as AOL, censor the newsgroups available to their subscribers, most do not. There are newsgroup services offering totally uncensored newsgroups to their subscribers. It would seem that these Internet Service Providers offering newsgroups with illegal content could be held accountable for the distribution of child pornography but apparently not.
In addition to children being able to access pornographic
images on web sites and newsgroups, the various chat rooms have the potential
of putting an adult pedophile in direct contact with children. These deviates cruise various chat rooms
looking for children, pre-teens and teens to chat with. They usually take on a phony identity and
often claim to be the same age or a little older to make children feel
comfortable in chatting. After
establishing a friendship they change the chat topic into sexual subjects and
will often attempt to meet the child or teen to further the friendship. I have read of numerous law enforcement
officers posing as young girls or boys in chat rooms and numerous adults
propositioned them or sent them photos of children in sexual acts in hopes that
the child would find it interesting.
One law enforcement officer was recently quoted in an article that said
the number of adult men sending her “Immediate Messages” (IM’s) was
unbelievable and that they were all seeking sexual information from what they
thought was a pre-teen girl.
Based on the preceding information, we offer these
recommendations to parents:
(1)
Do not allow your child to surf the Internet without
parental supervision at all times. We
realize that this is often difficult to do because usually both parents work
and have other things to do at night and on weekends. A recent study found that 75% of parents in online households let
their children surf the Internet with little or no supervision – this is
insane! Children usually resent parents
invading their space or privacy, especially if they have already seen some
inappropriate material on the Internet.
However, you wouldn’t drop your child off at the local adult bookstore
to roam around, but allowing your child to roam the internet and chat rooms is
far worse than 99.9% of the adult book stores and potentially far more
dangerous.
(2)
If you can not supervise your child at all times, consider
the purchase of a software program that will keep your child from accessing
objectionable sites and chat rooms. A
program described on Montel Williams’ show on October 26, 2000, appeared to be
great for tracking your kids’ surfing locations (Computer Cop,
1.800.784.3310). Unfortunately, some
children have computer skills far advanced over their parents’ skills and there
may be some potential for disabling the program. We will be evaluating some of these parental control programs in
the future and hopefully we will be able to make recommendations about what we
feel are the best programs available.
McAfee is currently running an interesting advertisement in magazines
for their Internet Guard Dog Pro program.
The ad has a pretty painting of a young girl and boy sitting and laying
on the ground peering into a hole in the ground that leads into a dark orange
cavern and the devil is sitting down there looking up. The caption in the center of the ad says
“Which parts of the Internet will your family visit?” The program allows the parent to set the standard and it will
block offensive Web sites, unwanted chat room talk and e-mails. It also protects against viruses and
malicious programs that follow your activities or steal your credit card
numbers.
(3)
Educate your child about the dangers on the Internet so they
know to advise you when they receive pornographic messages sent to them in
e-mails or Immediate Messages, or if an adult attempts to discuss sexual topics
with them or meet with them. An article
in June 2000 stated that 20% of online children have been propositioned by
adults and that 25% of online children have been exposed to unwanted
pornography. Unfortunately most
children and parents never make the proper notifications to law enforcement
agencies, and the offenders continue their efforts in corrupting our youth by
sending more pornography or making additional attempts to get an underage child
to meet with them. See our section
titled “How to Report Internet Crime” for more information on how to report
incidents involving your child. The FBI
recommends that you turn the computer off and keep it off in order to preserve
any evidence for future law enforcement use.
You should not attempt to copy any of the images and/or text found on
the computer unless directed to do so by the law enforcement agency.
(4)
The FBI recommends that parents always maintain access to
their child’s on-line accounts and randomly check his/her e-mails to make sure
that all contacts are legitimate.
ADVICE FOR CHILDREN
ON THE INTERNET:
The Internet is a wonderful resource for you if used properly for educational and research purposes. However, there are many web sites that contain objectionable material for anyone under the age of 18. Hopefully your parents will supervise you while you are using the Internet to make sure you don’t enter these bad sites. If they do not supervise you, they should have a program installed on your PC to keep you away from the bad sites and to keep bad sites from sending you invitations to join them by clicking on a hyperlink.
If you still receive Immediate Messages or e-mails from
pornographic web sites, immediately tell your parents so they can see what you
have received. They, or you after you
tell your parents, can then report the inappropriate site or sender to law
enforcement agencies who will take action.
It is against the law for anyone to send you dirty pictures or
invitations to web sites containing dirty pictures.
You should be aware that chat rooms are also full of people
who are not what they claim to be. They
may say they are a girl or boy 12 years old or 16 or an age the same as you but
very often they are really older men or women who like to start friendships
with younger people like you. If they
ask you if you are alone, or in your own room with the door shut, then you can
believe they are someone older who is pretending to be younger and they want
you to be by yourself and not near your mom or dad. Sometimes they will tell you after a while that they are really
older but that it is “okay” for you to chat with them. Do not believe them – it is not okay for
older people to chat with you because they are almost always going to start
talking about sex with you. They may
ask for personal details about your body and what you have done sexually. They may ask you about what you would like
to do sexually if you haven’t done anything yet. They will ask you to send them your picture – don’t send your
photos to anyone you do not know. They
will ask you for your telephone number or if you don’t want to give out your
telephone number they will ask you to call them. Never give out your telephone number because they can find out
where you live if you give out your phone number. Never call them because they probably have caller ID that will
show your telephone number if you call them.
They may ask you to call them collect if it is long distance – do not
make collect calls because they will get your phone number either from caller
ID or from their telephone bill. You
should NEVER agree to meet anyone because you do not who they really are and
your life will probably be in danger if you do meet them. You should stop chatting with anyone who you
feel uncomfortable with and you should let your mom or dad know right away if
someone asks you for your telephone number or if they ask you to meet
somewhere.
Do not feel bad at all about possibly getting your chat
“friend” in trouble because you did the right thing in reporting him or her to
your parents. The bad people on the
Internet will continue to take advantage of young people like you unless they
get reported and you could possibly save another young person from being raped
or killed if you report them. Can you
imagine how bad you would feel if you did not report the bad person and he or
she sexually assaulted or killed another kid your age? Do the right thing and report the bad
people!
(OR, IS THAT PICTURE
REALLY LEGAL?)
Millions of Internet users have browsed what seems to be
millions of x-rated and pornographic web sites and Usenet news groups, often
downloading graphic images to their hard drive, floppy drive, or zip
drive. The Internet has done more to
widely distribute pornography, and child pornography, than anything else in
history. While photos of adults
probably won’t get you into trouble, photos of boys and girls under the age of
18 should be avoided.
While doing various searches on different search engines, we
have noticed a proliferation of “teen” sites, often featuring underage
teenagers and pre-teens in bikinis, bathing suits, bras, panties, etc. There are “no-nude” teen newsgroups that
contain photos of pre-teen and teen girls in various types of attire, including
candid photos of girls taken with spy cameras in local shopping malls and on
the street. We have even discovered web
sites supposedly owned by young teenage girls that contain photos of them in short
shorts or bikini and advertising videos that you can buy of them bouncing on a
trampoline, riding a horse, walking around their yard, etc. These young ladies are even available as
models for photographers. Proceeds from
the videos and modeling assignments are alleged to go into their college
education funds. The average gent or
lady may think that these images are legal because the subjects are clothed but
this is not necessarily so. This is
actually child exploitation and illegal.
We have subscribed to several magazines dedicated to personal
computers for many years and we have read countless articles on how to improve
your PC’s performance, how to improve your operating system, how to install
various hardware components, where the most useful web sites are, and how to
buy the best printers – scanners – CPU’s – monitors – video cards, etc. The articles have contained virtually every
subject concerning PC’s you could ever think of, but we have yet to read an
article describing child pornography, how to avoid it, the penalties for
possessing it, the penalties for distributing it, and how to determine if a
graphic is legal or illegal. One would
think that people need to know these important facts but the topic is like a
skeleton in a closet that no one wants to talk about.
Child pornography is sick behavior and totally unacceptable
for many reasons, notably that innocent children are being abused when forced
to participate in it. Possession of
what is deemed to be child pornography is illegal. While state statutes vary from state to state with varying
punishment levels, Title 18 of the U. S. Code outlines what federal agencies
follow in prosecuting offenders. It
states that “the scope of ‘exhibition of the genitals or pubic area’ ….in the
definition of ‘sexually explicit conduct’, is not limited to nude exhibitions
or exhibitions in which the outlines of those areas were discernible through
clothing” and “that the production of a visual depiction involve the use of a
minor engaging in ‘sexually explicit conduct’ of the kind described ….. are
satisfied if a person photographs a minor in such a way as to exhibit the child
in a lascivious manner.” It is safe to
assume that if the underage subject is depicted in a sexually inviting or
suggestive pose, or displayed in an unnatural pose or in inappropriate attire,
that the image can be determined to be child pornography. Federal penalties for possession of child
pornography are severe, often in excess of penalties for actual child abuse or
for using the Internet to lure children to have sex.
You have probably worked hard all of your life to achieve
your current status. Is it worth losing
your wife, family, friends, job, reputation and tens of thousands of dollars in
legal fees and possibly fines, not to mention a few years of your life in prison,
for possessing inappropriate images of girls and/or boys under the age of
18? Think hard about the consequences
because you never know what you are in for if you get caught. The best thing you can do if you possess
such images is to destroy them immediately by deleting them and reformatting
your hard drive or using a program to “wipe” your deleted files by overwriting
them with x’s and o’s.
Our advice is to never visit web sites and news groups
containing underage subjects. Do not
trade pictures with other collectors unless you specifically state that you
will report them if they send you child pornography images. Do not click on anything that appears to be
child pornography in legitimate Usenet news groups. Some deviate from France recently posted child porn in a very
conservative military newsgroup and solicited readers to trade with him, giving
his mailing address and telephone number.
Do not join chat rooms where people
type “list me” and then send photos among themselves, regardless of the chat
room topic, because occasionally a child pornography photo is sent out even
though only legal bikini photos were supposed to be exchanged. Once you have downloaded the illegal image
you are in possession of it, even if you did not expect that type of photo to
be sent to you. Report the sender to
the appropriate law enforcement agency immediately and save the image for
evidence purposes only. If you don’t
report the sender then he or she will continue to spread the cancer of child
pornography to hundreds and thousands of other Internet users.
Additional information will be added to this page in the
future as we build our web site.
Scams
The U. S. Government launched the Internet Fraud Complaint
Center in May 2000 to provide service to individuals who wish to report
incidents of online fraud. Over 18,000
complaints of Internet fraud were filed by Americans last year and no one knows
how many more cases went unreported.
The Fraud Center is staffed by 12 FBI agents and 25
representatives of the National White Collar Crime Center. The center disseminates the information to
the appropriate local, state and federal authorities. They also analyze complaints and suggests methods of dealing with
criminals who use computers to defraud victims. The center gives law enforcement agencies to a place to look up
pending cases, get statistics on Internet frau and find information on frau
patterns and trends.
All 50 state attorneys general have signed on as members of
the new system and more than 100 Better Business Bureaus have agreed to provide
to provide complaint information along with consumer complaints from the Mail
Fraud Complaint System.
To learn more about the center, or to report a case of
fraud, visit: www.ifccfbi.gov
How to report Internet Crime
Do your part in reducing crime on the Internet! Report the crimes to appropriate agency as
listed below:
Child Pornography or Exploitation: Local FBI Office
Imported Child Pornography: U. S. Customs Service Local Office or
800.232.2538
Child Exploitation and Internet U. S. Postal Inspection local office
Fraud matters
involving the
U. S. Mail
Computer Intrusion (hacking): Local FBI Office
National
Infrastructure Protection Center (NIPC) 202.323.3205
Local
U. S. Secret Service Office
Password trafficking: Local
FBI Office
National
Infrastructure Proection Center (NIPC) 202.323.3205
Local
U. S. Secret Service Office
Copyright piracy: Local
FBI Office
Imported: U. S. Customs Service Local
Office or 800.232.2538
Theft of trade secrets: Local
FBI Office
Trademark Counterfeiting: Local
FBI Office
Imported: U.
S. Customs Service Local Office or 800.232.2538
Counterfeiting of Currency: Local
U. S. Secret Service Office
Local
FBI Office
Internet Fraud: The
Internet Fraud Complaint Center www.ifccfbi.gov
Federal
Trade Commission
If
securities fraud, Securities and Exchange Commission
Internet harassment: Local
FBI Office
Internet Bomb Threats: Local
FBI Office
Local
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) Office
Trafficking in explosive or Local
FBI Office
Incendiary
devices or Local Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and
Firearms (ATF) Office
Firearms over the
Internet
Blue Ridge Thunder – www.blueridgethunder.com
FBI – A Parent’s Guide to Internet Safety – www.fbi.gov/library/pguide/pguidee.htm
Cyberangels – www.Cyberangels.org
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children – www.cybertipline.com
PedoWatch – www.PedoWatch.org