US warns about drug use on net

 

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Posted on 7 Oct 2008 at 14:34

The US government's director for the "war on drugs" has accused websites such as MySpace for not doing enough to clamp down on the glamorising of drugs. John Walters, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said that parents need to monitor their teens' online activities.

A recent study carried out by research firm Nielsen Online polled 6,000 teens, found that five per cent of them saw at least one drug-related video that month; more than a third of those teens were under 16.

Walters warned that there is a plethora of amateurish pro-drugs material on the web, glamorising everything from cocaine to the use of bongs to smoke cannabis.

"Parents would be horrified to think that people are sneaking into their house to encourage their kids to build a bong or to chug on beer at age 13," said Walters.

"The fact is those people are sneaking into your house through your Internet connection on your computer," he said.

Walters said while the number of teens in the study who viewed drug-related videos was limited to 5 percent, he suspects the number of teens exposed to that content over the course of a year is higher.

The study found 40 percent of the drug-related videos seen by teens in the study contained explicit use of drugs or footage of intoxicated users.

"Kids already did stupid stuff, but what's new is kids are recording what they're doing and broadcasting it for the world in competition for a kind of celebrity," said Peter Zollo, co-founder and chief executive officer of TRU, a market research firm that studies how teens use the internet.

Walters said teens rely heavily on the internet for schoolwork, and parents cannot simply pull the plug, but did advise them to check the browser history on their teens' computer.

Also, since the videos are posted on sites where teens meet other internet users, Walters encouraged parents to look at text messages and incoming and outgoing phone numbers on their teens' cell phones.

"Nobody's talking about censorship over the internet here, what we're talking about is legitimate parental supervision," he said.

Author: Dawinderpal Sahota