Politics on the Hudson

Gov. David Paterson signed legislation this morning that would require sexual offenders to register their online screen names with state authorities and ban them from joining Internet social networking sites.

Paterson was joined by legislative leaders and Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who pushed for the legislation after reaching settlements with sites, such as Facebook and MySpace, over inappropriate material on their Web pages.

The law will:—Require sex offenders to register all of their Internet accounts and Internet names and email addresses with the State Division of Criminal Justice Services.
—Authorize the Division of Criminal Justice Services to release the information to social-networking sites and other online services to help prescreen or remove sex offenders from using the site and potentially notify police.
—Mandates that convicted sex offenders who are serving a term of probation, conditional discharge or parole be prohibited from using the Internet to contact children.

There were also some funny exchanges during the press conference that Liz at The Daily Politics recounts.