Growing Crimes On Craigslist

The Portland Tribune.com ran a story about more crimes being committed through the use of Craigslist. The crimes have ranged from theft, assault, extortion, prostitution and child exploitation.

The story brought up a good question. Should an Internet site be held responsible for crimes committed through the use of a classified ad? How about a newspaper? I personally don't think the website should or could be held liable for the misuse of their service.

The story also told about a man named Trench Reynolds who has started a blog about Craigslist related crimes http://www.craigscrimelist.org/. He made an interesting observation in the article Craigslist or Crimeslist?:

“I’m probably posting 30 to 40 stories a month just on crimes connected to Craigslist,” Reynolds said. Reynolds believes that a major reason why criminals are attracted to Craigslist is its anonymous nature. People posting ads do not have to report any identifying information to anyone.
“There’s no screening or regulation at all about who can use it. If you place a classified ad for something, you’ve got to give somebody your name and address. But on Craigslist, nobody knows who you are or where you live,” Reynolds said. “The inmates are running the asylum.”

So, is this a fair representation of Craigslist? Probably not. A lot of responsibility lies with the person that responds to any particular ad. However, I do believe that the anonymity factor does present a dangerous side to this form of advertising.

This is yet another reason why I like the flugpo community so much. You can put a face and a name to the person selling something to you. You have to register to become a member. This takes some of the anonymity out of the situation. Chances are, you have joined discussions in the forum with the person you are considering buying from!

Nothing is foolproof and hardly anything is safe anymore. It is nice though knowing that there might be a safer alternative.