Google Street View A Child Safety Threat?

(CBS)  As if the TV series "To Catch a Predator" didn't create enough paranoia, now there's a campaign to protect our children against predators who use Google Street View.

I admit, there may be some privacy concerns resulting from Google taking pictures of homes and businesses around the country. But StopInternetPredators.org's campaign to highlight child safety concerns over Google's Street View strikes me as absurd. The organization, which is headed by Stacie D. Rumenap, former deputy director of the American Conservative Union, argues that Google Street View "can be misused by child predators to target children."

In a video that appears on the site, Rumenap says that it's "frighteningly simple" for anyone "to find out detailed photographic information about you and your family." The video and accompanying text make it seem as if Google Street View is a predator's best friend for targeting children for abuse.

Rumenap calls it "an entirely new threat to our families and children" that "makes it simple to map the most likely route your child walks to school "... view entrances to community parks and even find the location of your family's bedroom windows."

She wants people to "urge local leaders to ban Street View in your neighborhood until the technology is safeguarded." She does, however, admit that "banning Street View might not safeguard our children 100 percent from child predators."

To begin with, Google Street View would be a very inefficient way for a predator to find a child victim. It would be much more effective to simply walk or drive around the neighborhood. It's not as if you need the Internet to find parks, schools and homes where children live and play. There are schools, parks and homes with bedroom windows in just about every neighborhood. And, statistically, the vast majority of predators know their targets anyway - in real life, not online.

Instead of banning Google Street View, maybe we should put up walls between streets and sidewalks so that predators can't see children walking home from school. And while we're at it, let's ban public outdoor parks and recreation areas or at least find ways to hide the children playing there. Or just keep children away from churches, schools and other places where pedophiles have been known to operate.

Rumenap's campaign completely distorts the way predators operate - at least those who are "successful" in finding victims. Research shows that trolling online for victims is not how predators typically find young people to exploit. In about 80 percent of child sexual abuse cases, the victims and the perpetrator know each other in the real world through family ties, friendships, schools, youth groups and situations that bring kids and adults together.

Based on what we know from arrest records, survey research and other data, the actual danger of Internet predators harming victims they find online has been greatly exaggerated. This campaign simply adds fuel to that fire. If a child is to be harmed online, it is much more likely because of bullying or harassment from a fellow young person, something inappropriate the child posts online or by taking extraordinary risks in a chat room or other public forum.

If anything, campaigns like this increase danger to children by alarming people unnecessarily and distracting us from dealing with real risks.

I'm not suggesting that Google Street View doesn't bring up some privacy concerns. It's probably a good idea for people to look up their own address just to make sure there's nothing posted that could be embarrassing or a possible security threat. A Google representative said that "if you are not comfortable with the imagery available on Street View, we have easily accessible tools for flagging sensitive imagery for review and removal."

Of course, it's essential for parents to talk with their children about safety. Adults should study the child safety tips from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and remind kids to follow some basic guidelines. That, along with age-appropriate parental supervision, is what will protect our kids - not going ballistic about the possible safety implications of every new piece of technology that comes our way.

(Disclosure: I serve as co-director of ConnectSafely.org, a nonprofit Internet safety organization that receives financial support from several Internet companies, including Google.)
By Larry Magid

[brhq]

Paranoid much, Stacie? Banning Street View will have no effect whatsoever on child safety. I agree with the author, the energy put into this campaign is misplaced.

[octavianfdlr]

She does, however, admit that "banning Street View might not safeguard our children 100 percent from child predators."
-The Article
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Good point. The expected effect (approximately 0%) is not exactly the same as 100%!

[stlouisx50]

You have got to be kidding me. You are going to blame Google for taking images at random, where it just happens to catch kids in the area on camera? So because of this a child predator has a better chance at knowing where kids play? That''s crazy! Who the hell is going to go frame by frame to see if they can find a kid playing in a yard, street ect that just happened to be caught by googles cam.

There are more worries in the world than this. I''d bet that this Rumenap idiot is a predator his self and his background should be checked.