"Sexting" Shockingly Common Among Teens

While it may be shocking, the practice of "sexting" - sending nude pictures via text message - is not unusual, especially for high schoolers around the country.

This week, three teenage girls who allegedly sent nude or semi-nude cell phone pictures of themselves, and three male classmates in a western Pennsylvania high school who received them, are charged with child pornography.

In October a Texas eighth-grader spent the night in a juvenile detention center after his football coach found a nude picture on his cell phone that a fellow student sent him.

Roughly 20 percent of teens admit to participating in "sexting," according to a nationwide survey (pdf) by the National Campaign to Support Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy.

"This is a serious felony. They could be facing many years in prison," CBS News legal analyst Lisa Bloom said of the six teens in Pennsylvania.

But, Bloom added, "What are we going to do, lock up 20 percent of America's teens?"

Police in Greensburg, about 30 miles east of Pittsburgh, say the girls are 14 or 15 and the boys charged with receiving the photos are 16 or 17. None are being identified because most criminal cases in Pennsylvania juvenile courts are not public.

Police say they first learned about the pictures in October. They say a student had a phone turned on in class, a violation of school policy, which prompted an administrator to confiscate the phone and subsequently find the pictures, reports CBS station KDKA-TV.

[i8246i]

Journalism is supposed to be without heavy-handed opinions shoved in your face....

Whoever wrote this "article" needs to be fired and sent off to Fox News where this kind of yellow journalism is the norm.

[xanadul00]

Wait a minute first thing I wouldn't think it would be shockingly. Second thing why is the school official going through the phone you take from the teen. i understand taking the phone because of school rules but going through it WOW. Also to the comment it's a serious felony then change the law. No normal person would think it should be a felony a put teens on the sex offender list for life. I know in Texas there was a bill trying to be worked into the state that had a point about this very thing to not make kids felons and sex offenders just because they are doing what kids do.

[i8246i]

And who's to say that the "school official" going through these students' phones aren't doing it for their own perversions.

If I was a father of one of the teens that had their phones unreasonably searched, I'd have an official investigation filed to have the principal/vice principal's computer searched for "backups of evidence".

[CBSTV]

Nudity, the body when not covered by cloth, is not "pornography."

[BigBang76]

We complain about the religious zealots in the Middle East and their crazy, hardline laws, yet the Bible-thumping-religious-right of the U.S. is not that much different. They have gradually turned our country into nearly a police state. These minors are NOT child pornographers! When I was young, we used to xerox our rear-ends at the school library to have fun in much the same way as today's kids and nobody was ever arrested for committing a felony...maybe a detention or two, but no jail!

[JavaMcPhearson]

Serious Felony? Should they perhaps be charged with sedition or treason and deported to Gitmo? A minor sending pictures of themselves to a minor now constitutes trafficing child pornography and is a serious felony? Likely it was the NSA that intercepted the calls.

[usa1dsszzz]

how is a naked human body porn? i didnt see the "law" but ya know what i dont need to. if this was illegal then all places that have all ages of humans naked would also be PORN? NO? the citizens have something called "JURY NULLIFICATION", so what is the probelm almost everyone here is talking about? does anyone here even know wht the hell i am talking about, does anyone here even care? [let them make all the laws they want, we are not required to convict when we think the LAW is stupid, but the JUDGE wont tell you that. will he/she?] before you know it they would be out of a JOB! GOOGLE THE TERM, YOU MAY EVEN LEARN SOMETHING!!!

[djseavy]

It won't change. Our politicians have made a personal fortune in devising laws to lock everyone up for something. The country is broke, we can't seem to shed illegal immigrants, the government is as corrupt as it can get, and they're going after teenagers. What a bunch of self-righteous SOB's. I hope one of their own kids gets caught up in sexting, then we'll see how equal THAT kid is treated.

[wheelnut53]

Thank you well said

[Deldemcclung]

Obviously this is not a REAL free country. Hysteria and paranoia are rampant. The government is run by psychopaths. Three fourths of the population is delusional. The entire lot of military personel are traitors and criminals. (Invading a sovereign foreign country without legal cause, self defense, is criminal and thus the killing of the population of that country is mass murder.) TSA and Homeland Security (sic) are busy molesting us at the airport and soon at a highway and bus station near all of us. And the kids are being dumbed down so they will be obedient little subjects. Dumbed down and indoctrinated by their own parents, no less. Pitty the poor soul that should dare to think for his or her self and dare to act like the Natural Human Beings that they were meant to be. Pathetic!

[OrangPuteh]

The only people who find this "shocking" are moralizing religionists who despise their own humanity. They are sick.

[Pico2020]

This is hilarious! Here we say we can't possibly imprison or deport millions of illegal immigrants because there are so many of them that it's practically not a crime. Then we say that our own teen population - our OWN children (who, by the way, are acting exactly like teens) should and will go to prison and be marked for life, no matter how many there are. O.J. goes free but we're gonna hunt down little Mary Beth Highschooler for taking a photo of her backside!!! Why do invent severity of crimes as to how they fit with our own personal view?

[OrangPuteh]

What you are seeing is religion at work.

Sexting kids are saying, "Show me yours and I'll show you mine."
What you are seeing is religion at work.

Sexting kids are saying, "Show me yours and I'll show you mine."

How is that different from yesteryear? Would any of you readers have been labeled as "SEX OFFENDERS for life for having shared a glimpse at your bodies?

Moralizing religious fanatics will not be satisfied until we are all behind bars and they are in control.

There was a time when moralizing religionists were in control.
Those were THE DARK AGES.

How is that different from yesteryear?

Moralizing religious fanatics will not be satisfied until we are all behind bars and they are in control.

There was a time when moralizing religionists were in control.
Those were called The Dark Ages.