Name: Michael A. Cox

Source: Ecommerce News

Link: http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/41004.html

Title: Regulation of Online Dating Services Sparks Controversy

As we have been talking about in class, internet growth brings not only new solutions and resources but it also promotes new problems. One segment is the online dating community. This is a segment that has really grown during the past couple of years. One newcomer, True.com, has instigated background checks for criminal activities, marriage and sexual offenses for its member and is lobbying for legislation to make all online dating sites do this also. The only state that has set up any such legislation yet is California. Currently, they require online dating services either to do background checks or disclose on their website that they do not. Should an online dating service operating in California not do this they will be charged with a misdemeanor for every day that they do not comply. The real issue here is internet standards. As the internet grows the government is going to have to make more and more decisions such as this to decided what types of legislation standards will apply to the internet.

This is a very interesting topic. When we think of ecommerce regulation we don’t usually think of online dating sites. This potential legislation is on a slippery slope. While the government is trying to make sure that consumers of services such as this are protected by possible fraudulent and dangerous people, they have to decide where the line is is on these regulations. I know that I wouldn’t be interested in using an internet dating site but if I did I don’t think that I would like for people to be running background checks on me.

As the internet continues to grow issues such as these are going to continue to be more commonplace. Let’s just hope the government sets up reasonable standards that don’t overstep their bounds of censorship or allow online consumers to be duped.

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