Solon Still Targets Web Harassment

Rep. Stephen Hartgen , R-Twin Falls, says he plans to re-introduce legislation at the 2010 Legislature targeted at prohibiting harassment on the Internet, including social networking sites. Hartgen, a former newspaper publisher, still wants to expand harassment laws so they apply to online communication including e-mails, text messages and posted comments on personal blogs and related Web sites. Hartgen has cited the 2006 case in Missouri in which a 13-year-old girl committed suicide after receiving online taunts from a woman posing as a teenager on MySpace. The incident prompted that state to update its laws. “There have been quite a few cases this year of cyber-bullying noted around the country of one kind or another,” he said. “You’d like to have a tool in place that could deal with that”/ Jared S. Hopkins , Twin Falls Times-News. More here .

Question: Is there enough of a problem re: Internet harassment in Idaho to warrant Hartgen’s legislation?