First off, to reassure the mods, given the nature of my question, I won’t be posting any links to the material.
Secondly, I’m not sure if there is a factual answer to my question; I don’t know if a case like this has come before the courts. So perhaps this should belong in GD, but I’m more interested in what the case is now (even if it’s “no one knows, such a thing was never envisioned”) than what should be, so I’ve put it here.
OK, now that I’ve gotten that out of the way… As I’m sure some of you are aware, there’s a fair number of webcam sites out there where, if you’re so inclinded, you can watch a person live their life (or at least their life that involves the room where the webcam is) at a rate of 1 frame per 30 seconds. And while I have no concrete numbers on what percentage of operating webcams are being used by people under 18, it seems from my own browsing to be a fair amount. And on some of these sites there is, well, nudity. Which isn’t necessarily illegal in the US in and of itself (we’d have to get into questions of whether the posing is lewd, etc), but the possibility exists that it is. But futhermore, I have seen webcams run by people who appear to be underage where there’s no question that some of the pictures are child pornography under US laws if my assumptions about the participants’ ages are correct (e.g. two teenage girls fondling each other while partially undressed).
So… Since producing such material is illegal, someone has committed a crime in making it. But who? Well, the kids themselves, I guess, but… Prosecuting kids for exploiting themselves seems odd to me. Can it be done? Has it been done? Have any cases about this been dealt with lately?
While I was waiting for this page to load, I pondered the title. I thought it had something to do with a teenager taking photos of themselves when they’re underage, and selling them once they turn 18 (not that I did anything like that, of course).
Your question probably implies that the parents are liable, but IANAL.
I suppose that, in the case of a webcam, the worst-case scenario would be that someone complains to the kid’s ISP and a judge somewhere orders her to shut it down. Like maybe in the case of the two teenage girls fondling each other that you mentioned; if you were to complain to her ISP, they might make a few phone calls and get it shut down. I think the fact that it’s all on a webcam might also make a difference. IOW, if you catch her webcam when she’s fooling around, it’s the textbook definition of child porn. But you’re quite a bit more likely to catch her studying algebra. So the fact that it’s 99% mundane stuff and 1% child porn might make prosecution difficult if not impossible.
If the matter were more serious; say, some 14-year-old Lolita somewhere was photographing herself having sex and posting the pics on the web, I see no reason why she wouldn’t be charged with a crime. Even if she was exploiting herself.
It’s against the law for teens to smoke, and that only effects them so I guess we could make it against the law for teens to have internet sex. I can’t imagine how you would enforce this.
Hijack.
Is it against the law for a 18+ years old to have ‘virtual sex’ with a under 18 year old??
Child pornography is illegal… regardless of whether the child is willingly participating or not. The hard part, of course, is trying to determine if the person is 14, 16, or 18. Some people just look young and while you might assume they were underaged, they aren’t necessarilly.
I believe there are law enforcement agencies trying to track down these sites so they can be shut down. Whether they choose to prosecute someone is an entirely different matter. They tend to go after the big fish mainly.
If you want to have the site shut down contact the ISP hosting the website and cc the FBI. That should get their attention…
Theoretically. But, fortunately, all of those “under-18’s” that the perverts are cybering with are actually 45-year-old bald accountants with pot bellies.
The chances of a very young person being able to buy a computer, get it home ( gonna carry it on his scooter?) buy a phone hookup, a web cam, Etc. & put it on the net is zippo, so an adult must be involved somewhere.
Far as I know the law doesn’t care about the age of the person doing the illegal stuff. Why, I bet the folks would be arrested as they are legally responsible for the children until the children are 18; but probably they would be given a warning first.
I remember reading about an actual case like this. The cops busted some guy and seized his computer. On the hard drive they found a picture of an underaged boy masterbating. He was charged with posession of child pornography. It turned out later that the picture was of him, that he had taken of himself years ago. IIRC, the charges were dropped.
How should the law handle a case like this? What if he had still been underage?
This thread just reminded me of something. When I was in high school a bunch of us guys used to take pictures of our cocks. What we would do was find a girl with a camera and then when she wasn’t looking grab the camera and do a buch of penis/balls shots. We thought this was the funniest thing. “wait till she gets that film developed” Of course, most photo places probably wouldn’t return those types of pics, and I don’t remember anything special happening.
Ask a bunch of parents if they know exactly what their teenager is doing online, and I’d be willing to bet that a fair percentage have no real idea.
I have a religiously devout Aunt and Uncle who decided, after they bought their PC a couple of years ago, that they’d forgo getting internet access rather than risk exposing their children to the evils of the online world. My twelve year old cousin managed to sign up for Juno without their knowledge and keep it secret for awhile. Kids are usually much smarter than they let on.
