The proposed child e-mail registry, where parents would submit addresses that would be barred from opening a MySpace account, raises questions about privacy and security, he wrote. The database could also be circumvented by acquiring an alternate e-mail address.

Thierer also warned that a proposed online child safety task force must not become a rubber stamp for age verification mandates, as some state law enforcers seemed to imply. Age verification is a thorny, technical issue that has serious free speech implications, he said. Read the full document here.