10:51am Wednesday 10th March 2010
By Peter Barron
It's good to see the national papers finally catching up on the Facebook scandal following the trial of Peter Chapman, the man who killed Darlington student Ashleigh Hall.
Today's Daily Mail devotes its front page to Facebook being under fire for refusing to adopt the official paedophile safety button.
The button, adopted by other social networking sites, enables children to get expert advice at a single click if they fear they are being targeted by sex offenders.
The Northern Echo has been putting facebook under pressure for months, ever since 17-year-old Ashleigh was murdered by Chapman, the sex offender disgracefully allowed to roam the country by Merseyside Police.
There is a momentum building here that I believe Facebook will ultimately find impossible to resist.
If Facebook continues to defy calls to act, the Government should legislate to force social networking sites to feature the safety button.
In the meantime, all parents should ban their children from using Facebook until it agrees to a more responsible approach.
There is no excuse.
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