News Bits: MySpace Blocks 90,000 Sex Offenders

Written by Erin Barker

Wednesday, February 4. 2009 at 11:10 AM EST 1 comment

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MySpace yesterday revealed that over the past two years they have identified and blocked 90,000 sex offenders from the social-networking site -- 40,000 more than they've previously admitted to.

MySpace disclosed this information in response to a subpoena, to a task force of state attorneys general investigating sex offenders' use of social networking. MySpace says it hired background verification firm Sentinel Safe Tech Holdings Corp. two years ago to identify sex offenders on the site after incidents occurred. 

The task force is still awaiting a response from a similar subpoena issued to Facebook .

Facebook chief privacy officer Chris Kelly said in a statement that the company had "not yet had to handle a case of a registered sex offender meeting a minor through Facebook."

Also: "Unlike MySpace or other social networking sites, Facebook has always enforced a real-name culture and has developed and deployed social verification and powerful privacy rules that allow people to interact in a safer and more trusted environment."

However, Sentinel CEO John Cardillo argued on TechCrunch that sex offenders booted from MySpace may have fled to the "safe haven" of Facebook. He claims to have "found over 8,000 offenders on their site without much effort," and he suspects that "the real number is 15 to 20 times that."

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