[/caption]Sexting, or sending nude, semi nude or sexually suggestive pictures or messages on cell phones or over the internet is an ever increasing problem for teens and their parents. Although it may be hard to believe, kids as young as 6th grade have been caught "sexting" nude pictures of themselves of forwarding pictures of others.
Please read the excerpt from CBS News and watch the videos below. Comment on what you see as potential dangers of this practice. Should parents monitor their teenager's cell phones? Computers? Facebook? What should you do if someone sends you an inappropriate picture? Do you send it on? Do you delete it? Do you tell your parents?
(CBS/ AP) While it may be shocking, the practice of "sexting" - sending nude pictures via text message - is not unusual, especially for high schoolers around the country.
This week, three teenage girls who allegedly sent nude or semi-nude cell phone pictures of themselves, and three male classmates in a western Pennsylvania high school who received them, are charged with child pornography.
In October a Texas eighth-grader spent the night in a juvenile detention center after his football coach found a nude picture on his cell phone that a fellow student sent him.
Roughly 20 percent of teens admit to participating in "sexting," according to a nationwide survey (pdf) by the National Campaign to Support Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy.
"This is a serious felony. They could be facing many years in prison," CBS News legal analyst Lisa Bloom said of the six teens in Pennsylvania.
But, Bloom added, "What are we going to do, lock up 20 percent of America's teens?"
Police in Greensburg, about 30 miles east of Pittsburgh, say the girls are 14 or 15 and the boys charged with receiving the photos are 16 or 17. None are being identified because most criminal cases in Pennsylvania juvenile courts are not public.
Police say they first learned about the pictures in October. They say a student had a phone turned on in class, a violation of school policy, which prompted an administrator to confiscate the phone and subsequently find the pictures, reports CBS station KDKA-TV
CBS News January 15, 2009
ABC News
Teen Sexting on the Rise
A new study finds nearly 30 percent of teens have sexted.
07/02/2012
Who is Responsible? What is your role if this happened?
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