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Links: Vigilantism Against Pedophiles
Posted by Steven Wu on Friday, March 19 @ 19:29:38 EST Computer Crime
Wired has an interesting story about a group of vigilantes who basically pose as young girls on online chatrooms and then publicize the information of potential child molesters after getting all sorts of information from them, including photos, addresses, etc. The story is here. The group, called Perverted Justice, has a website here. Their slogan? "Wannabe pedophiles target underage kids in regional chat rooms. Perverted Justice targets wannabe pedophiles in regional chat rooms."

I have sort of mixed feelings about the project. For one thing, the vigilantes seem to work pretty hard to overcome the initial reluctance of some of their targets--I'm not certain if they initiate chats, but they certainly re-initiate contacts in chat rooms, make affirmative efforts to call, etc. This might mean that they "catch" some people with admittedly sick desires who would never have succumbed to those desires absent such provocation.

They also seem to publicize this personal information (at least some of the time) before the target actually does anything that would even qualify as an attempt. So they're basically outing people who are very sleazy, but not criminals.

Finally, as with any private action, there are serious problems with accuracy and accountability. What happens if a hoax chat transcript goes up one day? Sure, in that situation, the wrongly targeted person could sue to have the site removed, but (1) the website operators are anonymous and so may be difficult to catch, (2) the tainted information is still out there and may even still be on Google's cache.

I admire the goals of this group. But I'm not very comfortable with the means they've adopted.

 
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Re: Vigilantism Against Pedophiles (Score: 0)
by Anonymous on Friday, March 19 @ 23:28:24 EST
Seems to me that the group's name is accurate.


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Re: Vigilantism Against Pedophiles (Score: 1)
by Lulu_of_the_Lotus-Eaters on Saturday, March 20 @ 14:00:04 EST
(User Info | Send a Message) http://gnosis.cx/publish/
Unfortunately too, private vigilantes perpetuate the terrible flaw of FBI investigations: They attack people for pure fantasy. A high profile example was the Patrick Naughton case--mostly because he was a Disney executive.

The model in both cases is that an adult engages in a certain fantasy game with another online adult. The one side of the game involves writing things like "I'm only 13 y.o."--but in most cases, the other party doesn't really -believe- the age thing, it's just part of a game. Maybe it's not entirely psychologically healthy to have that fantasy, but it is recognized and limited to the level of imagination. Likewise, sex games with roles of master/slave, burgler/victim, cop/criminal might be psychologically peculiar--but they're not (and shouldn't be) illegal.

In the Naughton case, he met with an adult FBI agent in person, and was arrested, charged, and convicted for doing so. But the very fact that he met with someone who was obviously an adult--and continued to be interested in the sexual encounter he anticipated in that face-to-face context--more-or-less PROVES the "pedophilia" was wholly at the level of fantasy. Of course, that little fact wasn't enough to keep him out of prison.


With the Perverted Justice folks, it's even worse. A Naughton-like character who chatters online in a similar role-playing game is likely to be "exposed" as a pedophile. Even though the same person quite likely has no interest whatsoever in actually engaging in pedophilia--and would probably be horrified at the prospect of such a thing.

Hysteria and witch hunts work that way.


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Fragility of Reputation (Score: 1)
by DougSimpson on Sunday, March 21 @ 07:31:28 EST
(User Info | Send a Message) http://dougsimpson.com
James, this vigilante behavior goes against the fundamental principles in civilized countries that respect civil liberties, whereby one is considered innocent until proven guilty and has the right to confront his or her accusers. It also violates the basic principle that retribution should be under the control of the state, with due process to prevent perversion of the power to stir up mob feelings or to engage in abuses of power. As much as all good people despise pedophiles and sex trolls in chat rooms, and fraudsters in auction sites, amateurs taking the law into their own hands will too often lead to disaster.

Just this year, the Web community saw the power of rumor and guerilla journalism to impair a reputation, with the flurry over rumors involving the leading Presidential candidate and a young woman who may or may not have been working in his campaign. After the blog community dredged the names through the mud, many realized that there was simply no "fire" where they at first thought they saw "smoke." But the reputational damage had been done in a matter of days. See
"Online Rumors and the Frailty of Reputation".



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Re: Vigilantism Against Pedophiles (Score: 1)
by PJ_Buster on Saturday, March 27 @ 03:52:15 EST
(User Info | Send a Message) http://www.geocities.com/pjbuster2003/
There is a burgeoning plague in the chat rooms - opportunists, predators, and deviants most vile. And that is Perverted-Justice.

Run by a self-styled libertarian ( Libertarianism [n]  an ideological belief in freedom of thought and speech ) , who never-the-less administers with a tyrannical grip. For example, the use of the word "harass" is forbidden even in debate among its inner-circle contributors, yet the site impetus thrives on all manner of foul language leveled against identified individuals whose real name, address, place of work etc. has been exposed to the world. Ah, but he was a "wanna be perv" you say. Most heinous. Thought crime is alive and well, and is punishable to the max by Perverted-Justice. Drooling lemmings provide phone fury a-plenty doled out to spouses, neighbors, and even children of the prey. But don't fret - since "harass" has been replaced by "contact", it's OK. Another bit of oxymoronic conduct is the contributor/moderator/senior spokesman held view that it's fine to counsel someone for suicide [ KashmirGoat: "... it wouldn't bother me in the least if he wound up sucking on the business end of a shotgun. I wouldn't loose any sleep over it" ... "That's the power and wrath of the public" ] as long as the cardinal rule isn't broken: not to contact the media or the police. Gotta have your priorities. Self-preservation is a must.

We pause, take a deep breath, count to ten, and realize that our collective moral outrage against rapists and murderers has been hijacked by a bunch of punk ass college kids who get off fantasizing that they're promiscuous 15 year-olds, holed up in an internet refuge of anonymity, a hacker's haven. Hmmmmm, they ruminate: should I watch Star Trek? Survivor? Play Nintendo? Or pretend to be a slutty slut slut. Decisions decisions. What's wrong with this picture?

While they are plying their skills to obtain personal information on their latest conquest, may he be condemned in effigy for all our pentup hatred ... perhaps we can take a time-out and see the site for what it really is. If not, this one may help you regain some perspective: http://www.geocities.com/pjbuster2003/ Oh be forewarned, you may find yourself compelled to think for yourself again. Just don't do any of them thar free-thinkin' on Perverted-Justice's forum. You'll get a quick lesson in libertarianism - your user ID and IP address is railroaded clear out of town. If you're lucky. Or perhaps you could be hacked, reverse-look-uped, MapQuested, department-of-motor-vehicled, real-estate propertied, school alumnied, and you may find yourself a veritable stalkee rather than a stalker. HEY, what's your picture doing on that telephone pole. Ooops. PERV!!! [ gesture: point and stare ]


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