Watchdogs File Brief In MySpace Case

The Center for Democracy and Technology, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Public Citizen and a group of 14 law professors filed a joint friend-of-the-court brief arguing that violating an Internet service's "terms of service" agreement isn't a criminal offense under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. The brief submitted in United States v. Lori Drew explains the legal theory behind the government's indictment of Drew would effectively criminalize the actions of millions of Web users. The suburban St. Louis mother allegedly created a false profile on the popular social networking site MySpace, posing as a teenage boy, to engage a 13-year-old neighborhood girl, Megan Meier, in conversation. Drew's conversations with Meier were allegedly cruel and harassing and Meier hanged herself.